“So,” he concluded, “now that I have been transparent and laid these facts before you, I can say I do not hold out much hope for you. Why should you, as number four, be any different than the boy, the monk, or the holy maid? Yet we are desperate. We must try everything to shake the Dauphin out of…How does one even describe His Majesty’s condition? His torpor? His melancholy? That would be putting it kindly. His mother-in-law, Yolande of Aragon, has tried and failed, and she is the greatest lady at court, the wisest of any of us. You know, I have kneeled with the flower of France’s nobility beside me and begged him to save the city of Orléans, even if I have to take a sword in hand myself—I, who have just turned sixty-four years old. I have told His Majesty in every possible way—plainly, secretly, laughing through bitter tears—that if Orléans falls, then we are done for, are you aware of this, my lord? This cursed war is like a game of chess, and the Dauphin’s forefathers have been playing it for ninety-two years. There were times when the game was stalemated and times, too, when England was steeped in its own troubles and it appeared we would win. But now we are losing. We are so close to losing everything.”

Joan listened. What he said didn’t surprise her. There are still places and people loyal to the Dauphin, but everyone in France—the prostitutes blowing kisses from their windows, the singing minstrels, the bakers, the tanners, the butchers, and the pig farmers—knows it isn’t enough to turn the tide of the war.

“Though before we can even talk of winning,” le Maçon continued, “we must turn our thoughts to Orléans. Without Orléans, all is lost, and the city has been under siege since October, with no access to the river, which means no supplies.”

She was fast losing patience with the aged courtier. Why had she been brought to this place only to receive a lecture? “You think I do not know this,” she said. “You would be amazed, you would find it incredible, how the names of royalty roll off our peasant tongues. In Domrémy, we do not confuse one Jean with another, one Charles or Philip or Louis with his forefathers or heirs. We have heard of the plight of Orléans and, before Orléans, of the losses at Verneuil, as terrible as Agincourt, a reminder of what it means to be humbled. We know all the great defeats: how Meaux fell, Rouen was starved out, a former King of France captured at Poitiers, and Calais besieged.” Her mind is moving backward in time and ticking off battles, most of them French defeats: more stories from her uncle. “Shall I go on?”