keeping me awake. Tomorrow a young woman’s life will be altered. Whether or not she has bedded the count, the empress’s childhood will come to its real end when she crosses the border from Austria into France. Braunau will be the last Austrian city she ever sees, and the food she’s had tonight she will never taste again. Tomorrow she will ride toward Compiègne to meet her husband. Like a lamb to a pack of wolves , I think, and close my eyes, remembering what I had hoped for on my first voyage to Paris.
I was almost eighteen—nearly the same age as the empress—whenPauline convinced me to leave Haiti. But unlike this girl, the choice had been my own. The war was tearing apart my family, and my mother refused to speak with my half brother when she saw how he supported Napoleon’s invasion. She had been like a parent to him. Luc’s own mother had died when he was seven years old. Yet here he was, offering the French soldiers free food and wine, knowing they wanted to enslave the woman who had raised him. I was tired of the anger poisoning our house, and with Pauline, there was the promise of a future—and calm.
My mother cried tears of relief that I was leaving and would no longer be caught up in France’s war. But by leaving my father’s plantation, I abandoned my family to a fate far worse than discord. The message that arrived telling me of their deaths was written by our neighbor.
“ They are gone ,” he wrote a year after I arrived in Paris, “ and I am returning to France and civilization .” But it was the French who killed my family, the French who enslaved my Haitian mother, and the French who started the war.
Yet if not for the French, I wouldn’t exist.
I think of my father and how happy he would be to know that of all the learned men in Paris, I am the one the emperor seeks out when he wants to discuss Voltaire. If he were alive, he would be writing me letters about the winter’s harvest, telling me how tall the beans have grown and how lazy Luc is still. We would joke about Maman’s weariness of the rain and avoid the subject of war at all costs.
No one should lose their family. But tomorrow, when we set out for Paris, this is how the new empress of France will feel. I think of the sacrifice she is making for her father as the cold hours pass. Then a cock crows on the grounds of this palace of ice and snow, and I rise to dress. When I open the door to peer outside, the halls are still dark. There are guards positioned at every stairwell, and I ask the nearest man how to find the empress’s chamber.
“Up there. Largest door on the right.”
I climb the stairs and imagine how warm it must be right now in the Tuileries Palace. A careless servant has forgotten to shut a window,and outside a heavy mist has enshrouded the trees. There is no understanding how these people can survive like this, in cold so intense it can take away your breath.
When I reach the empress’s door, a pair of Austrian guards step forward.
“What is your business here?”
“I’ve come to wake the empress.”
“Her Majesty has ladies for that.”
I look at the young man and can see him fighting to keep awake. “This is by order of the queen, who has been given her orders by the emperor of France. The empress must be woken at five o’clock.”
The boy glances at his fellow guard, and the other man shrugs.
The men move aside and allow me to knock softly. I am expecting a sullen maid instructing me to come back later, so when the empress herself answers, I step back. “Your Majesty.” I bow quickly, and behind me, the guards immediately do the same. It is obvious she has not had any sleep. Her eyes are red and swollen. I peer over her shoulder into the dimly lit chamber, but there is no sign of Count Neipperg. If he has been here, she has hidden any traces of him.
“You’ve been told to bring me to Caroline,” she guesses.
I nod. “The queen’s desire is to leave by eight.”
“Her desire, or her
I was almost eighteen—nearly the same age as the empress—whenPauline convinced me to leave Haiti. But unlike this girl, the choice had been my own. The war was tearing apart my family, and my mother refused to speak with my half brother when she saw how he supported Napoleon’s invasion. She had been like a parent to him. Luc’s own mother had died when he was seven years old. Yet here he was, offering the French soldiers free food and wine, knowing they wanted to enslave the woman who had raised him. I was tired of the anger poisoning our house, and with Pauline, there was the promise of a future—and calm.
My mother cried tears of relief that I was leaving and would no longer be caught up in France’s war. But by leaving my father’s plantation, I abandoned my family to a fate far worse than discord. The message that arrived telling me of their deaths was written by our neighbor.
“ They are gone ,” he wrote a year after I arrived in Paris, “ and I am returning to France and civilization .” But it was the French who killed my family, the French who enslaved my Haitian mother, and the French who started the war.
Yet if not for the French, I wouldn’t exist.
I think of my father and how happy he would be to know that of all the learned men in Paris, I am the one the emperor seeks out when he wants to discuss Voltaire. If he were alive, he would be writing me letters about the winter’s harvest, telling me how tall the beans have grown and how lazy Luc is still. We would joke about Maman’s weariness of the rain and avoid the subject of war at all costs.
No one should lose their family. But tomorrow, when we set out for Paris, this is how the new empress of France will feel. I think of the sacrifice she is making for her father as the cold hours pass. Then a cock crows on the grounds of this palace of ice and snow, and I rise to dress. When I open the door to peer outside, the halls are still dark. There are guards positioned at every stairwell, and I ask the nearest man how to find the empress’s chamber.
“Up there. Largest door on the right.”
I climb the stairs and imagine how warm it must be right now in the Tuileries Palace. A careless servant has forgotten to shut a window,and outside a heavy mist has enshrouded the trees. There is no understanding how these people can survive like this, in cold so intense it can take away your breath.
When I reach the empress’s door, a pair of Austrian guards step forward.
“What is your business here?”
“I’ve come to wake the empress.”
“Her Majesty has ladies for that.”
I look at the young man and can see him fighting to keep awake. “This is by order of the queen, who has been given her orders by the emperor of France. The empress must be woken at five o’clock.”
The boy glances at his fellow guard, and the other man shrugs.
The men move aside and allow me to knock softly. I am expecting a sullen maid instructing me to come back later, so when the empress herself answers, I step back. “Your Majesty.” I bow quickly, and behind me, the guards immediately do the same. It is obvious she has not had any sleep. Her eyes are red and swollen. I peer over her shoulder into the dimly lit chamber, but there is no sign of Count Neipperg. If he has been here, she has hidden any traces of him.
“You’ve been told to bring me to Caroline,” she guesses.
I nod. “The queen’s desire is to leave by eight.”
“Her desire, or her
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