Chapter Text
Claire’s fingers tightened in his hair as Athos kissed her again.
She sat on the edge of his desk, one knee brushing his hip, the other hooked loosely around the back of his leg. The reports she had brought — the reports they were supposed to be reading — lay scattered around her in various stages of abandonment. One was trapped beneath her palm, and Athos was fairly certain another one, from a contact in Amiens, was currently under his left boot.
None had produced anything useful, or told them where the grey army had gone once the estates in Savoy were stripped bare.
In any case, Athos was no longer looking at any of it.
His hand had found its way around Claire’s waist some time ago and had not seen fit to leave. His other hand rested against the desk beside her, dangerously close to upsetting the inkwell. He moved it without breaking the kiss.
The window stood open behind them, letting in the sounds of the courtyard below: steel striking steel, someone swearing after what sounded like a particularly unsuccessful parry. Athos had left d’Artagnan supervising the afternoon drills. Judging from the frequency with which his voice carried through the window, the arrangement had not improved the recruits’ technique.
It was precisely from that window that another voice rose above the noise.
“Captain!”
Claire opened her eyes and turned her head by a fraction. Athos leaned forward instead and caught her mouth again, and she made a quiet sound of amusement, pulling him closer.
“Captain!”
Closer this time. Jacques, unless Athos was mistaken.
He drew back perhaps half an inch. Listened. Then he looked at Claire — flushed, hair coming loose from its pins, the neckline of her chemise dragged low where his hand had been — and thought, not for the first time, that Tréville’s old office had never looked to any purpose quite like this.
Whatever was happening outside could survive another minute without him.
He returned to what he had been doing. Her hand settled at the nape of his neck in a manner that suggested she agreed with the assessment.
“Captain Athos!”
He closed his eyes and sighed against her mouth.
Claire laughed. “Duty calls,” she whispered.
“Duty,” he said, letting his forehead rest against hers, “has become remarkably persistent.”
Still, he stepped back, if somewhat reluctantly. He reached for the report that had fallen to the floor and set it back on the desk while Claire smoothed her skirts. One dark lock had come loose near her temple; she tucked it back into place.
Athos straightened his collar, found it uncooperative, straightened it again. She looked at him for a moment, then reached over and adjusted it herself. Her fingers brushed his throat as she did. He caught her wrist before he had decided to.
For one dangerous second, neither of them moved.
“Captain!”
This time, the voice was just behind the door. A quick knock followed.
Athos exhaled through his nose and released Claire’s wrist. Then he crossed the room and opened the door. “What?”
Jacques stood at attention just outside, red to the ears, his gaze fixed somewhere over Athos’s left shoulder with studied concentration. “Captain. Théa’s here. She says— she says it’s urgent.”
“Théa generally says that.”
“She seemed to mean it this time, Captain.”
Athos considered him for a moment, then looked back at Claire. She was already moving with the brisk pace she reserved for anything Théa deemed urgent, and shot him one last amused glance as she walked past him.
He followed her out into the yard.
Aramis and Porthos had already drifted closer; d’Artagnan came a step behind, still working a kink out of his shoulder from the drill.
“I hope you’re aware,” he muttered to Athos as he passed him, “that you’re beginning to owe me quite a few favours.”
Athos lifted a brow. “Then we may finally be approaching even.”
Théa stood just inside the gate with her arms folded, and one look at her face told him Jacques had, for once, undersold it. There was no grin when she saw them approaching, no teasing remark about the length of time Athos had taken to answer, or the fact that Claire had just followed him out of his office.
“Something wrong?” Porthos asked. “It’s not often that we see you so serious.”
Claire emerged from behind his broad frame. “Jacques said it was urgent.”
“I have a message for you,” Théa said, pushing herself away from the wall. “But that can wait. There’s something you need to see first. All of you.” She looked around at them. “Come on. Quick.”
Then she turned and marched out without bothering to stop and check if they followed.
She set a punishing pace, cutting through the afternoon crowds without once looking back. Athos kept beside Claire; the others spread loosely behind them as they crossed one street, then another. Théa offered no explanation, and after the second attempt to draw one from her earned only a terse you’ll see, Porthos gave up asking.
It was not until the red uniforms began to multiply around them that Athos understood where she was taking them.
The iron gates of the Red Guard quarters had been thrown open onto the street. Sacks of flour and potatoes were lined against the wall. A table had been set up outside, with two guards seated behind it and another standing at one end, addressing the small crowd gathered before them.
Athos counted perhaps thirty people waiting in a line that curved along the wall. Men and women, mostly. A handful of children. Bundles at their feet, clothes patched and worn thin. Some faces were new, driven into Paris from the countryside as the spring campaigns at the front resumed. Others, Athos had come to recognize too easily over the past months.
Refugees.
Théa stopped at the edge of the square.
“...a place in the training program,” the Red Guard was saying. “Regular meals and wages for every man accepted. Families will receive an allowance for the duration of his service, as well as flour and provisions today.”
A murmur rippled through the line. Near the front, a woman drew a boy of perhaps sixteen closer and began speaking urgently into his ear.
On the table before the guards lay a ledger, a stack of papers and several small purses of coin. Marchaux stood a few paces behind it and watched another young man bend over the ledger to sign his name.
Athos looked at Théa. She was staring at the line, her jaw set.
“There,” she said. “Urgent enough, don’t you think?”