Boulogne-sur-Mer was a graveyard of ambition.
The invasion camp stretched for miles along the grey cliffs. Fifty thousand tents. A forest of masts in the harbor.
But there was no wind in the sails. No smoke from the cookfires.
Just the smell of rot and despair.
General Soult met us at the command tent. He looked like a skeleton in a uniform. His cheeks were hollow. His eyes were dead.
"Your Majesty," Soult rasped, bowing low. "Welcome to the Army of England."
"Where is the army, Marshal?" I asked, stepping out of the carriage.
The sea air hit me. It was cold, salty, and damp.
It felt good. It cooled the fire in my veins. My skin stopped steaming for the first time in hours.
Soult pointed to a group of soldiers sitting in the mud. They were huddled around a pot of boiling water.
"There," Soult said. "And there. And there."
I looked closer.
They were boiling leather belts.
"They are eating their equipment," Soult whispered. "The supply lines from Paris are dead. The local farms are stripped bare. We have had no bread for three days."
He looked at me with desperate hope.
"Did you bring gold, Sire? The men won't fight for a ghost. They want pay."
I looked at the starving faces.
Fifty thousand men. The greatest army in Europe. Reduced to scavengers.
I felt a pang of pity.
But pity is inefficient.
"I have no gold," I said loudly.
The soldiers looked up. Their eyes widened. Disappointment. Anger.
A murmur started. "No gold? Then why is he here?"
"Quiet!" Soult shouted.
I raised a hand.
"I have no gold," I repeated. "But I have something better."
I turned to Napoleon.
"Where are the smugglers?" I asked.
Napoleon blinked. "Smugglers, Sire?"
"Boulogne is a port," I said. "War or no war, trade happens. Brandy for wool. Silk for steel. Someone is crossing the Channel."
"There is a warehouse," Soult admitted. "The 'Red Lion.' It's run by a man named Jean-Luc. He claims to be a patriot, but he sells to the highest bidder."
"Take me there," I ordered.
I walked toward the docks.
The Old Guard fell in behind me. They were tired, but they were loyal. And they were terrified of me.
We marched through the mud.
The warehouse was a massive brick building at the end of a rotting pier.
I didn't knock.
I kicked the door.
BANG.
The wood splintered. The lock shattered.
Inside, a dozen men were sitting around crates of brandy. They jumped up, reaching for pistols and knives.
Jean-Luc stood in the center. He was a bear of a man with a red beard and a scarred nose.
"Who breaks my door?" Jean-Luc roared.
" The King," I said, stepping into the light.
Jean-Luc sneered.
" The King is dead. You're just a fat man in a coat."
He pulled a knife. A long, curved blade.
He lunged.
I didn't move.
Charles did.
He slid out from behind me. A grey blur.
He touched Jean-Luc's wrist.
FREEZE.
Ice spread instantly. It covered the knife. It froze the tendons in Jean-Luc's hand.
SNAP.
The blade shattered.
Jean-Luc screamed. He dropped the handle. His hand was white and useless.
The other smugglers froze. They saw the boy with the cold eyes. They saw the steam rising from my shoulders.
"Sit down," I said.
They sat.
I walked to a chest in the corner. It was reinforced with iron bands.
"Open it," I ordered Jean-Luc.
He fumbled with his good hand. He unlocked it.
He threw the lid back.
Inside, stacks of paper.
Not French assignats.
British pounds.
Crisp, white five-pound notes. The Bank of England.
"Patriot, are you?" I asked, picking up a stack.
"It's... it's just business," Jean-Luc stammered. "The British pay well for cognac."
"I'm sure they do," I said.
I held a note up to the light.
I took off my glasses.
My eyes spun. Click. Whirr.
I focused on the watermark. Britannia sitting on her shield.
But I didn't see art.
I saw data.
The lines of the shield were too precise. The waves under her feet were a binary code. Dash-dot-dash.
I looked at the serial number.
A894-322-X.
It wasn't random.
A = Sector 1. 894 = Coordinates. 322 = Time stamp. X = Action: Hold.
"Genius," I whispered.
Rothschild hadn't just built a network. He had built a contagion.
Every banknote was a packet of information. Every transaction updated the ledger.
If I spent this in London, the serial number would register at the bank. It would tell Rothschild exactly where his money was flowing. It was a real-time map of the economy.
But maps can be redrawn.
I looked at Charles.
"Do you have a pen?" I asked.
He pulled a quill from his pocket.
I dipped it in ink.
I changed one digit on the serial number.
A894-322-Y.
Y = Action: Liquidate.
I smiled.
"General Soult," I said. "How many men are in your camp?"
"Fifty thousand, Sire."
"And how many notes are in this chest?"
Jean-Luc swallowed hard. "Two hundred thousand pounds, roughly."
"Confiscated," I said.
"But..."
"Confiscated!" I roared. The warehouse shook.
I turned to Napoleon.
"Distribute it," I ordered. "Four pounds to every soldier. Tell them it's an advance on their conquest."
Napoleon looked at the money.
"British currency, Sire? They can't spend it here."
"Exactly," I said.
I walked out of the warehouse.
We went back to the camp.
I stood on a crate of ammunition.
The soldiers gathered. Thousands of them. Starving. Angry.
I held up a fistful of notes.
"Soldiers of France!" I shouted.
My voice carried over the wind.
"The Republic paid you in paper that was worthless! The Empire pays you in the enemy's gold!"
I threw the notes into the crowd.
They fluttered down like snow.
Men scrambled. They fought. They laughed.
"But you cannot spend it in Boulogne!" I yelled. "This money is useless here! It only has value across the water!"
I pointed to the grey horizon. To the fog bank hiding England.
"There is food in London! There is wine in London! And now, you have the ticket to buy it!"
A roar went up.
"To London! To London!"
They forgot their hunger. They forgot their fear. They saw the money, and they saw a future.
I stepped down.
Napoleon was waiting. He held a stack of notes.
"You changed the numbers," Napoleon whispered. "On the top notes. Why?"
"Viral injection," I said softly.
"What?"
"If they spend these notes... the Bank of England will try to reconcile the serial numbers. But they won't match the ledger. It will create an error."
I took a note from him.
"One error is a glitch. Ten thousand errors... is a crash."
I looked at the sea.
"We aren't just invading, General. We are flooding the market with bad data."
I smiled. It was a cold, sharp smile.
"Rothschild thinks he owns the economy. I'm going to show him what happens when you introduce hyperinflation to a closed system."
I turned to Soult.
"Prepare the barges," I ordered. "We leave at dawn."
"But the fog..." Soult protested.
"The fog is perfect," I said. "It hides the virus."
I walked toward my tent.
Charles was waiting. He looked at the celebrating soldiers.
"They're happy," Charles said. "They think they're rich."
"They are rich," I said. "For now."
I looked at the note in my hand.
Five Pounds.
I crumpled it.
"Until the market corrects itself."
I looked across the channel.
"Knock knock, Rothschild," I whispered.
"The auditor is here."