The Queen's Own Fool
Chapter One
Rheims
The rain poured down throughout the day, hard and grey as cathedral stone. One
by one, we dragged to a halt. I stopped dancing first, then Annette, our skirts
hanging in damp folds, tangling in our legs.
"It is like walking with dead fish," I said. "Slip-slap."
Annette giggled. But then she found everything amusing. Even in the rain.
Taking the tin whistle from his lips, Bertrand flicked it several times, trying
to rid it of water. Nadine's tambourine went still, and she shifted little Jean
to her other hip.
Now Pierre alone kept going, flinging the clubs into the air. One and two, three
and four, five . . . I wondered if he were going to try seven at once, here on
the drowned streets of Rheims where no one would see him fail.
"What are you doing?" Uncle Armand cried out, and began hitting the rest of us
for stopping. "Troupe Brufort does not stop for mere rain!" His hand was like
some small, fierce, whey-colored animal nipping and pinching where it could.
Pierre dropped one of his rain-slicked clubs. It landed wit ... read full excerpt from: Queen's Own Fool ebook
