Darcy ran out of air, and his heart pounded as if it were trying to escape his chest entirely. “Are you insane?” he managed, glancing back over his shoulder. The soldiers were giving chase now, fury in their faces as they shoved past the crowd.
“Quite possibly!” Bingley huffed, not slowing in the slightest. “This way!”
They darted down a narrow alley, the sound of boots hammering behind them. The smell of sweat and fear mixed with something metallic, sharp in the back of Darcy’s throat. They were boxed in, walls too high, and there was no way—
Bingley suddenly stopped short, a hand on Darcy’s chest. “Hold on.” The alley turned sharply ahead. Bingley motioned for silence, gasping for breath as they pressed against the wall, barely concealed by a stack of barrels.
Darcy’s pulse thundered in his ears, and his limbs trembled as he tried to flatten himself against the rough brick. This was madness. This was utterly—
The soldiers rounded the corner at full speed, just missing them, the sound of their pursuit fading into the next street. Bingley let out a low breath, turning with a grin, though his face was pale.
“That,” he said, still panting, “was close.”
Darcy swallowed hard, his mouth dry, but there was no time for gratitude yet. “We’re not safe,” he whispered. “Not yet.”
Bingley nodded, and for the first time, Darcy noticed the blood. It was seeping through the shoulder of Bingley’s coat, a deep crimson spreading fast.
“Good God.” Darcy reached out instinctively. “You are wounded!”
Bingley glanced down at the gash as if it had just occurred to him. “Ah. Yes, well. It’s not as bad as it looks.” He winced, waving off Darcy’s concern. “Bayonet, I think. Lucky it wasn’t worse.”
Darcy stared at him, his throat tightening. The man was an idiot. A bloody, reckless idiot.
And he owed him his life.
The thought settled in his chest like a stone. Darcy, who had always believed in careful planning, in prudence, had just been saved by a man who had leaped headfirst into danger without a second thought.
Bingley, the boy from trade, who Darcy had barely spared a glance for. And now—
Now he could not think of anything but the fact that this foolish, smiling young man had just thrown himself between Darcy and a blade without hesitation.
“Why?” Darcy heard himself ask, his voice hoarse. He did not mean to say it, but the question hung between them in the damp air. “Why would you do that?”
Bingley looked at him for a moment, blue eyes bright with a mix of pain and mischief, then shrugged. “Couldn’t very well let them have you, could I?”
Darcy blinked, stunned into silence. There was nothing else to say. No one had ever done anything like that for him before.
And just like that, the world shifted, subtly but irrevocably, in the space of a heartbeat.
“We need to get to Calais,” Darcy finally said. “But first—let us get that shoulder seen to.”
Bingley smirked. “Don’t suppose you know how to sew?”
Darcy, against all odds, felt a laugh bubble up through his chest. It was ridiculous. The entire day had been chaos, but somehow, standing in a filthy Parisian alley with a man who had just saved his life, it did not seem quite as dark as it had moments ago.
“No. But I will figure something out.”
The salt-tinged air whippedacross the docks at Calais, the sky a gray smear that promised either a dismal rain or a quick escape, depending on how fortune played her hand. Ships bobbed in the harbor, their masts swaying in the wind, and the dockworkers moved with frenetic energy, hauling crates, securing lines, and barking orders. It felt like the last breath before a storm.
Darcy stood with his cousin Richard, his eyes scanning the chaotic scene. Beside them, Sir Thomas Ashford was issuing brisk instructions to a clerk, who was scribbling furiously on a sheaf of papers. Every so often, Sir Thomas would glance up, his eyes flicking across the crowds, watching for familiar faces—anyone he might have missed. It was as if he carried the weight of every young Englishman stranded in France on his shoulders.
“That’s the last of the names I’ve managed to track down,” Richard said, holding up a small list. “We should have everyone on board within the hour.”
“Good,” said Sir Thomas without looking up. “But I am not finished yet.”
Darcy frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I’m going back to Paris.” He straightened, folding the clerk’s notes and tucking them inside his coat. “There are still a few boys from the rooming house unaccounted for. I saw them arrested the night the peace broke.”
