Read Chapter 13: The Price of Glory

The parade ground gleamed under a pale September sun, every brass button and polished saber catching light like a promise of glory. Étienne Moreau stood at attention in the front rank of his restored company, the newly sewn sergeant-major stripes fresh on his sleeve, and tried not to think about how many of the men beside him had been dead men walking only weeks before.

They had given him a new uniform for the occasion. New boots, too. The army knew how to dress a hero when it wanted one.

The regimental band struck up a march as the reviewing party approached. Moreau recognized the tall, silver-haired figure at its center before he could make out the face—General Lefebvre, newly promoted, newly gilded, wearing the stars of a division commander like a man who had earned them rather than stolen them. Beside him walked Colonel Charpentier, whose eyes found Moreau immediately and held him with the cold attention of a hawk marking wounded prey.

Lefebvre stopped before Moreau. The general was a handsome man in his fifties, with the easy smile of a born courtier and eyes that never quite warmed.

"Sergeant-Major Moreau," Lefebvre said, loud enough for the assembled regiment to hear. "The Army of the North owes you a debt. Friedland will be remembered, and so shall your name be remembered with it."

Moreau kept his face still. *Remembered*, he thought. *Or buried*.

Lefebvre unpinned the Legion of Honor cross from his own chest—a calculated gesture, meant to be seen—and reached up to fix it to Moreau's collar. His fingers lingered there a moment too long, adjusting the ribbon with theatrical care.

"The Emperor himself has been told of your deed," Lefebvre continued, his voice still pitched for the crowd. "To seize an enemy color from the hands of its bearer—there is no higher act of courage in a soldier's life."

The regiment cheered. The men around Moreau stamped their boots and shouted his name, and for a moment—just a moment—Moreau let himself feel the weight of what he had done. The eagle had been heavy in his hands, slick with blood. The Russrian officer who had carried it had died with a bayonet wound to the throat, though it had been Moreau's pistol that put him down.

The cheering faded. Lefebvre leaned in, his mouth close to Moreau's ear, his smile still fixed for the watching officers.

"I read your letters," Lefebvre whispered. "Every line. You write well, sergeant-major—eloquent, even. The Minister of War's clerks must think you a veritable philosopher of grievances."

Moreau's blood went cold.

Lefebvre straightened, clapped him on the shoulder with fraudulent warmth, and stepped back to address the regiment once more. "Sergeant-Major Moreau will dine with me tonight. A hero deserves better than the mess tent."

---

The meal was a private affair in Lefebvre's quarters, a confiscated manor house outside the camp perimeter. Charpentier was not present. A single servant poured wine and retreated, leaving Moreau alone at a long table with the man who had ordered his squadron to die at Eylau.

Lefebvre ate slowly, savoring each bite, while Moreau's food sat untouched before him.

"You're wise not to drink," Lefebvre said eventually, setting down his fork. "I might have had it poisoned. But then, I might not have. You'll never know, will you?"

"I know you shot my squadron commander for failing to hold the mill," Moreau said. "I know you burned the records office to bury the casualties you caused. I know you sold half a regiment's worth of horses to a Prussian broker three days before the battle."

Lefebvre's smile did not falter. "And I know you kept a deserter hidden in your baggage for eleven days. Roland, isn't that his name? A coward who ran from the colors, and a sergeant-major of the Imperial Guard who protected him." He lifted his wine glass in a mock toast. "We are both men who know things, Étienne. The question is what we do with that knowledge."

Moreau said nothing. His hand rested on his thigh, inches from the knife at his belt. Lefebvre's guards were outside—two men, he had noted them at the door—but they would take a half-second to react.

"I propose a trade," Lefebvre said. "You give me the letters. All of them. And the deserter." His voice was pleasant, unhurried, like a man discussing the weather. "You are a hero now. A Legion of Honor. The men adore you. The Emperor has heard your name spoken favorably. If I add my recommendation—"

"I would rather die."

"—you could have your commission before winter," Lefebvre finished, as if Moreau had not spoken. "A lieutenant's epaulettes. A staff position, even. You're too old for the colors, Moreau, and everyone knows it. This is your chance to rise."

Moreau stood up. The chair scraped against the polished floor. "You sent thirty-seven men into a killing field to cover your own retreat. You told Marshal Lannes the column was already across the river. You murdered my commander for refusing to sign your lie." He was trembling, he realized—not from fear, but from the effort of keeping his hand off his knife. "I don't want your recommendation. I want your name on a scaffold."

Lefebvre's mask finally slipped. His face went hard, cold, the easy confidence replaced by something older and more patient—a man who had destroyed better soldiers than Moreau and watched them buried.

"Then I'll have you shot," he said.

"You need a crime."

"I have one." Lefebvre reached into his coat and withdrew a folded paper, which he tossed onto the table between them. Moreau did not touch it. "That is a letter, written in your hand, addressed to the Prussian major who commanded the enemy force at Friedland. It offers to deliver the regimental battle plan in exchange for gold."

"That's a forgery."

"It's signed by you. It's dated three weeks ago. And it was found, conveniently, in the quarters of the deserter Roland—who will swear, before a military tribunal, that you gave it to him to deliver." Lefebvre smiled again. "How do you think a court will rule, sergeant-major? The hero who saved the eagle? Or the traitor who sold his own regiment, now exposed by a coward's confession?"

Moreau stared at the paper. The handwriting was good—very good. Someone had studied his letters closely enough to mimic the slant of his hand, the particular way he crossed his t's.

"Roland will testify for me," he said.

"Roland will testify for the man who promised to let him live." Lefebvre stood, brushing crumbs from his coat. "He's a deserter, Moreau. He asked for protection and got eleven days of it. I can offer him a pardon signed by a general, and a discharge with full honors." He walked around the table, stopping beside Moreau, close enough that Moreau could smell the wine on his breath. "You're a brave man. I've known many. They all die the same way—mouth open, eyes wide, trying to believe it isn't happening."

The door opened behind them. Moreau heard the tread of boots, the click of rifles being brought to port.

"Do we have an agreement?" Lefebvre asked.

Moreau looked at the forged letter on the table. He looked at Lefebvre's satisfied face. And he heard, distant and quiet as a remembered drumbeat, the voice of his old captain—the one Lefebvre had shot for refusing to lie—saying *honor is not a coin you spend when the price gets high*.

"No," Moreau said.

Lefebvre's eyes went flat. "Then you will spend the night in chains, and tomorrow you will learn what the word *traitor* costs in the Grande Armée."

He walked out. The guards seized Moreau's arms before the door had finished closing, and the Legion of Honor cross—still pinned to his collar, still warm from the general's fingers—caught the lamplight like a single glittering accusation.