Hyacinth Girl

Belladonna Boudreaux was not given to introspection. In fact, she hated the very girly fact that she was still in love with a man she'd barely seen in five years. "I should just kill him," she muttered to herself. It was a Sunday afternoon and she had far too much free time. She settled in the little French Quarter courtyard of the house she and her – soon to be dead if she had anything to say about it – husband had purchased before their wedding. It was a nice house, with period woodwork and solid iron-work. The garden was filled with roses and hyacinths and lilies. Honeysuckle climbed the walls. The smell of flowers was heavy in the air. She sipped her coffee, savoring the bite of the Chickory.

She let her blonde hair settle over her shoulders. The small braids she kept to frame her face were starting to fray at the ends. It was time to redo them and possibly change the beads. She fingered the small amethyst bead on the bottom of the front-most braid. She smiled. Remy had given it to her before Jean-Luc had adopted him. He'd found it or stolen it or maybe even bought it for her. They'd been all of ten. She'd worn it in her hair ever since. She'd be buried with it. She missed those innocent days.

Her eyes stung from the pollen heavy in the air. Remy was in New York and she was in New Orleans. There was no cure for the disease that was tearing their marriage apart. Julian was alive – scarred, twisted, and more insane than ever, but her husband was still banished. She threw her cup across the courtyard. It shattered with a satisfying tinkle. Coffee ran down the wall into a bank of purple-flowered hyacinths. A flash of movement caught her eye and she nearly threw the knife that she'd automatically pulled. Gris-Gris was just checking that the noise wasn't a danger. She wouldn't kill him for doing his job.

She tucked her knife away in the sheath she wore under her loose top. She should be safe here, in her own home, but safety was more fragile than the blooms around her. She remembered feeling safe once. Remy had filled her room with hyacinth blooms and sat reading poetry to her while she recovered from being stabbed through and through with a sword. His voice had wrapped around her, mixed with the sweetness of the hyacinths. Even now the scent of hyacinths was the scent of home.

A shadow flashed on the flagstone. Her head snapped up to follow the cause of it. Hope rose in her chest only to be crushed by the sight of a pigeon. With no coffee to occupy her hands, she started unraveling her braids. The beads dropped onto the still intact saucer with delicate clinks. The blue one was Venetian glass from when she was training in Italy. The green one was Czech-garnet from her mother's trip to Prague. The deep purple was another amethyst from Remy on her 15th birthday to complement the smaller, lighter one he'd given before. She continued to shed the memories from her hair. Once her hair was free, it hung in zig-zag waves that framed her face. She ran both hands through it, trying to release the stress in her skull. Too soon she would have to return to her duties as leader of the Assassin's Guild.

She closed her eyes and leaned back in her chair. She sighed and let the blossoms surround her. A soft petal caressed her cheek. "Bonjour, Husband."

"Happy Birthday, Belle," he whispered. He slid a package onto her lap. He put his hand over her eyes. "No, don't look, if you see me, you have to kill me remember?"

"Oui," she whispered sadly.

TBC