The next day
The dawn crept slowly over Versailles, softening the sharp lines of the palace roof with a pale gold light. In the silence before the great halls filled with courtiers, the sound of boots echoed faintly against the marble floor outside the Dauphin's chamber. The knock that followed was discreet, not the ceremonial rap of a servant, but the clipped signal of a man trusted with secrets.
Louis-Joseph, already awake and seated at his desk, closed the leather-bound notebook in which he had been sketching rough diagrams of irrigation wheels. His instincts told him who stood on the other side of the door before the latch turned.
"Enter, Jean," he said.
The door opened and Jean Dupri stepped in, his tall frame outlined by the candlelight. His dark hair was tied back, his uniform neat but bearing the small scuffs of a man more familiar with fieldwork than with courtly posturing. There was always a faint trace of England in his vowels, a relic of his youth spent across the Channel before pledging his loyalty to France.
"You are early," Louis-Joseph remarked, rising from his seat. "That usually means your thoughts have kept you awake."
Jean smiled faintly, his grey eyes sharp yet tired. "It does, mon prince. This time, it is not war drills nor the state of our muskets, but… something deeper. A seed planted months ago, now beginning to grow."
The boy tilted his head, curiosity sharpening his expression. "Go on."
Jean closed the door behind him and lowered his voice. "Do you remember, sire, the proposal I made two months ago, when the talk in court was only of banquets and gowns? I asked for your blessing, in private, to establish a school—hidden, far from the eyes of courtiers and priests alike. A place where the unwanted, the forgotten, could be shaped into something greater."
Louis-Joseph's lips curled in the faintest of smiles. "L'Unité 141."
Jean inclined his head. "Just so. I kept it small, discreet, housed in the remains of an old hunting lodge in the north near Cergy. There, I gathered those no one would miss—the orphans of Paris, the street rats of Lyon, the foundlings of war. Eighty boys, no older than fourteen. And twenty girls, slightly older, sixteen or near enough, for they bear a quicker wit and a stronger sense of deception than the boys. A balance of steel and shadow, as I envisioned."
"And what do you teach them?" the Dauphin asked, though his tone already hinted he knew the answer.
Jean's eyes glinted with quiet pride. "Discipline. Obedience. Silence. They rise with the sun, train until their limbs ache, and fall asleep with a musket close to hand. They learn to march, to fight with blades and bare fists. But also, they learn the arts less visible—codes and ciphers, the shadow tongue of espionage, the art of reading a man by his posture. They are children, yes, but each day, less so. I call them not pupils, but recruits."
Louis-Joseph paced slowly. His candlelight shadow danced across the gilded walls. "Eighty boys, twenty girls. All orphans." He paused, glancing at Pierre with a mixture of approval and unease. "That is an army within an army. A blade forged in secret. Do they know whom they serve?"
Jean's accent thickened slightly as he answered, the English inflection bending his French. "They know only this: that France has given them food where others gave them none. That their loyalty must rest upon the crown, though the crown itself remains unseen. I tell them they are the forgotten children of the kingdom, and that in their silence, in their strength, they shall make themselves remembered."
The Dauphin moved to the window, gazing out across the gardens where the mist curled low over clipped hedges. "And yet they are still children. Do you believe they are ready to bear such weight?"
Jean's jaw tightened, but he did not falter. "Ready, no. But forged? Yes. Give me five years, and I will return you not boys and girls, but shadows and steel. Soldiers who question nothing, spies who vanish into crowds, knives that never shake in the hand."
A long silence followed, broken only by the faint chirp of morning birds. Louis-Joseph, though only a boy himself, bore the stillness of a man twice his age. His mind, sharpened by memories of another life, turned quickly over the implications.
This was more than a school. This was the seed of an institution, one that could outlast dynasties if carefully nurtured. A corps of the forgotten, bound not by wealth or name but by necessity, by loyalty purchased in bread and discipline. If guided well, it could become his most secret weapon.
But he also saw the risks. Children robbed of choice, their lives reduced to function. He felt the faint stir of unease, though it was not enough to dissuade him. History, after all, had never been written by the merciful.
He turned back to Jean, his expression calm. "Tell me of their progress."
Jean's face brightened slightly, as if he had been waiting for the question. "The boys—most had never held a weapon before. But hunger teaches swiftness. They learn fast. Their small size makes them quick, difficult targets. We run them in the forests until their lungs burn, then teach them to move silently, to listen more than they speak. The girls—ah, mon prince, they surprise even me. They learn languages faster than I can test them. They can slip into a tavern and draw secrets from a drunk soldier without lifting a finger. One, Elise, has already bested my best man at cards and left him red-faced in defeat. She is sixteen, with eyes like a hawk."
Louis-Joseph smiled faintly. "And they follow you without question?"
Jean nodded. "They have nothing else. No fathers, no mothers. Only the unity of 141—the number itself means little to them, but it binds them. They are a family where none existed."
The Dauphin returned to his desk, running a finger over the maps spread across it. "And what do you expect of me,Jean? Why bring this to me now?"
Jean drew a slow breath. "Because secrecy can only hold so long. If we continue, others may notice—the church, the ministers, even your father. They will call it dangerous, immoral, a corruption of youth. I need your shield, mon prince. Not today, not tomorrow, but soon. If these recruits are to serve you, they must know it is you they fight for. Quietly, invisibly, but truly."
Louis-Joseph sat, steepling his fingers. He studied Jean with eyes that carried both the innocence of childhood and the hardened weight of a soldier's past life. "If I give my shield, I give my name. And with my name comes responsibility. They would no longer be only yours,Jean. They would be mine."
Jean bowed his head. "So be it. I am their hammer, but you, mon prince, are the hand that wields them."
A hush lingered. Then Louis-Joseph leaned forward, voice low. "Very well. We proceed. You will continue their training. I will ensure their existence remains hidden, and when the time comes, I will decide how best to wield them. But one condition."
Jean raised an eyebrow. "Name it."
"They are not expendable," Louis-Joseph said firmly. "Not tools to be broken and cast aside. If they are to be my shadow, they must also be my blood, my shield. Train them to survive, not merely to obey."
Jean's lips parted, surprise flickering across his face before resolve settled in. He placed his hand to his chest in a gesture of solemnity. "I see that you're not yet corrupted, but for how long? As you command. They shall not be knives discarded in the dirt, but blades kept sharp, ready, and whole."
Louis-Joseph leaned back, his expression unreadable. Inwardly, though, he felt a grim satisfaction. If only you knew how corrupted I am , he thought. The world sees only a boy at his books, a Dauphin at play. But in the forests near Cergy, an army of shadows grows. And when history turns against me, it will find I am not alone.
The first rays of sunlight spilled into the chamber, breaking the heavy shadows of night. Outside, the palace stirred with life—the shuffle of servants, the chatter of courtiers eager for favor. But here, within these four walls, something altogether different had been born.
L'Unité 141 was no longer merely Jean's dream. It was now the Dauphin's weapon.