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dark eyes and sweaty chest, while d’Armagnac was in the country with his wife and children or at court with the King. So you can’t blame me. Can you?

Act 1, Scene 6
A duet
    S HE LETS S ÉRANNE IMAGINE he’s seducing her. It makes him happy. He’s gorgeous. Strong. Fine ankles. Still has all his teeth. He dreams of riches, of velvet breeches and a fine sword, of the King one day noticing his talent—his face—and begging him to become a chevalier, a gentleman of the chamber, an adopted son. One day.
    He wants her to move to Versailles with him, where he will sit at the right hand of the Sun King. Heaven.
    To her, Versailles is a hellhole, a place of dust and horse shit and old men. She insists she will never return. Even Paris starts to feel like a prison. The whole city is there, waiting for her. She knows it. But she’s not permitted to wander the streets, to go to the Opéra, to ride alone.
    She has to get away. From d’Armagnac. Everything. She whispers about it in the dark.
    ‘Run away with me.’
    Séranne settles back on the bed, his hands behind his head, grinning. ‘Where would you like to go?’
    ‘Who cares? We’ll be together.’
    ‘Are you serious?’ His smile vanishes. ‘I’m not going anywhere, Julia. I only just arrived. My destiny lies here.’
    ‘How can you know that?’
    ‘I was born for it—for this.’
    She considers that unlikely. He wouldn’t last a month at Versailles. She won’t last another month here in Paris.
    ‘But if you love me …’
    ‘Can you doubt it, my darling?’
    ‘Then?’
    He sits up. ‘No.’
    ‘We could go south, to Marseille. Your home.’
    ‘Especially not there.’
    She slides a hand slowly across his chest. The skin is tight against his rib cage. Something stirs inside her. She blinks it away. Concentrates.
    ‘Your family could hide us. In the castle.’
    ‘I’m never going back,’ he says. ‘You don’t know what it’s like.’
    ‘No. I want to see it for myself.’
    ‘You don’t understand how lucky you are, growing up at Versailles, living in Paris.’ There’s a whine in his voice. She’s never heard that before.
    ‘You think so?’
    ‘Where else would you want to be?’
    ‘Almost anywhere. Away.’ She tries to slide off the bed but he holds tight to her wrist. ‘I’m sick of being locked in this house. It’s like living with my father. Worse.’
    ‘But you have everything you want here.’
    ‘Do I?’
    ‘Silly girl. Let me kiss you.’
    She does.
    For now.

Act 1, Scene 7
Recitative
    T HE MISTRESS TOOK A LOVER . What of it? Why is that judged more harshly than the Comte taking a mistress? Or two? Yet it is.
    D’Armagnac didn’t look too fondly upon it, as you might imagine. I didn’t hide it from him—how could I? Everyone in the house was paid to serve his needs, just as I was, and that included telling him my every word and action. There were arguments—threats. Voices were raised. But I was used to fighting with my father, when only a fist to the face would end the debate, whereas d’Armagnac, bless him, was only used to arguing with his fellow courtiers, who can play a nastier hand than me, but do it in whispers. I was expected to grovel, of course, to weep and beg forgiveness. But it’s not in my nature. Instead I stood my ground.
    He dismissed Séranne immediately. I was locked in my bedchamber for two days until the great man was summoned elsewhere to deal with affairs of state, rather than a raging girl with a sword in her hand. The house fell silent again. I thought I had won. Ha!
    The next week a Monsieur Maupin presented himself at my door. D’Armagnac had sent him. La, you’ve never seen such a man. Clammy and stitched tight into a coat far too small for him, stockings much the worse for wear. One of those strange little men that grow up in the city and work until dusk and live with their mothers and never see daylight. I couldn’t for the life of me understand what he was doing there, sweating in front