The Sortie
April 29, 1429 — 10:00 AM
Outside the Burgundy Gate
The gates of Orléans, sealed for six months, groaned open. The rusty hinges screamed like a dying animal, a sound that echoed the stomachs of the men standing behind them.
Jean de Dunois, the Bastard of Orléans, rode out first. He gripped his lance, his knuckles white. He expected a trap.
But the air remained silent.
"My Lord!" a scout shouted, his voice thin and reedy. "Look!"
Dunois looked. The gates of the southern fort, Saint-Jean-le-Blanc, were wide open. No banners flew.
"They ran," Dunois whispered. "They saw Saint-Loup burn, and they ran."
He waved his hand. "Advance! But keep shields up!"
The starving garrison of Orléans surged forward. They didn't find a fight; they found a pantry.
The English had fled in such panic that their dinner fires were still burning. Cauldrons of porridge bubbled over the flames. Barrels of salt beef stood open.
The discipline of the French garrison—held together by Dunois's iron will for half a year—didn't just evaporate; it was devoured by instinct.
Men threw down their weapons. These were soldiers whose belts had been cut short three times to bind shrinking waists. Now, they became animals.
A spearman dove into a tent and dragged out a bucket of uncooked batter. He didn't wait for the fire. He scooped the grey, sticky paste into his mouth with filthy hands, swallowing it whole.
"Food!" a sergeant wept, falling to his knees before a barrel of salted herring. He clutched a stiff, dried fish like a lost child, tears streaming into his beard as he gnawed on the raw, salty flesh.
Nearby, a young crossbowman, having gorged himself too fast on wine and cheese, vomited violently onto the grass. His shrunken stomach rejected the sudden bounty. But he didn't stop. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, trembling, and reached for the wine again.
Dunois didn't stop them. He sat on his horse, watching his men debase themselves for survival. He felt a sting in his eyes.
This is what they did to us, he thought. They turned us into wolves.
He turned his gaze east, toward the smoking ruins of Saint-Loup. There, under a cloud of black smoke, a different army was waiting.
And a different King.
The Pragmatist
The Ruins of Saint-Loup
While the garrison of Orléans feasted on raw batter and salt fish, Napoleon's army worked.
The ruins of the fortress smelled of roasted flesh and sulfur. Napoleon walked among the debris, stepping over the English dead with the indifference of a coroner.
He saw a French man-at-arms using a dagger to pry a gold tooth from a dead archer's jaw. Another was struggling to pull a pair of fine leather boots off a stiffening corpse.
Napoleon watched them for a moment. He didn't feel disgust. He felt a cold, historical distance.
Medieval men loot bodies, he thought. Modern armies loot logistics.
"Let them take the boots," Napoleon said to Jean Bureau, who was watching the scene with a frown. "A soldier with good boots marches further. But the powder... the powder is mine."
Bureau nodded and directed a team of engineers, carefully rolling barrels of English gunpowder out of the cellar.
"Black gold, Sire," Bureau grinned, his face smeared with soot. "Forty barrels. Talbot was well-stocked. This is high-quality corn-powder, better than what we make in Chinon."
Napoleon ran a gloved hand over the wood of a barrel.
"Good. We will return it to them later," Napoleon said, his voice flat. "At high velocity."
He looked up at the wooden palisades that were still standing, the barracks that could still shelter a garrison.
"Burn the rest," he ordered. "Leave nothing standing. I don't want to garrison this pile of rocks; I want it erased."
"Sire!" A sentry called out from the perimeter. "Riders approaching! From the city!"
Napoleon turned. Through the smoke, a group of knights in battered, rusted armor was riding toward them. At their head was a man with a face aged by stress, his eyes sharp and suspicious.
Jean de Dunois. The Bastard of Orléans.
The man who had held the line while the King slept.
The Meeting
Dunois reined in his horse. He looked at the smoking ruins of the fortress that had choked his city for months. He looked at the piles of English dead. Finally, he looked at the small man in the grey coat sitting on a white mare.
Dunois dismounted. His movements were stiff, exhausted. He bowed, but his eyes remained fixed on the King's face.
"Your Majesty," Dunois said.
"Cousin," Napoleon nodded.
Dunois pulled a crumpled piece of parchment from his belt.
"I received your letter yesterday, Sire," Dunois said, his voice raspy. "It said the Maiden would bring the army to save us."
He looked at Jeanne, who was praying over a dying soldier nearby, then looked back at Napoleon.
"The letter promised a Saint," Dunois said, a hint of challenge in his tone. "It did not warn me that the King would be riding with her."
"Plans change, Jean," Napoleon replied calmly. "Saints provide hope. Kings provide artillery."
Dunois didn't smile. He looked at the King, trying to find the coward he remembered. He saw a man wiping soot from his hands, looking at the battlefield not with fear, but with the critical eye of an architect.
It didn't make sense.
"Sire," Dunois lowered his voice, stepping closer so the soldiers wouldn't hear. "This... this is dangerous work. The English main force is still at Saint-Laurent. They are shocked now, but they could counter-attack."
He gestured toward the riverbank.
"I have arranged flat-bottomed boats to ferry you across the river—or back to Chinon, if you wish."
It was the ultimate test. A polite door left open for a coward to run through. You didn't say you were coming, so you must have been dragged here. Here is your way out.
Napoleon looked at the boats moored nearby. Then he looked at Dunois.
"Boats are slow, Jean. And they are for retreating."
Napoleon pointed at the massive stone bridge occupied by the English fortress of Les Tourelles.
"I do not intend to paddle into my own city like a thief in the night. I intend to walk."
"Walk?" Dunois blinked. "But the bridge is blocked."
"Then we will enter through the Burgundy Gate," Napoleon said, climbing onto his horse. "Burn the boats, Cousin. We are staying."
Dunois stared at him for a long moment. The suspicion in his eyes cracked, replaced by a dawning, terrifying realization: He means it.
A slow, grim smile broke Dunois's tired face.
"As you command, Sire."
The Entry
The Streets of Orléans — 08:00 PM
Night had fallen, but the city was brighter than noon.
Thousands of torches lit the streets. The entire population of Orléans—thirty thousand souls who had lived in the shadow of death—poured out of their homes.
The procession began.
On the left, the English forts of Saint-Laurent and Croix Boissée loomed in the darkness. They were less than five hundred yards away.
The English archers were on the walls. They had the range. They had the angles.
But not a single arrow flew.
The English watched in paralyzed silence as the French army marched past them, torches blazing, drums beating. The psychological shock of Saint-Loup had broken their nerve. They were witnessing a resurrection, and they were too terrified to interrupt it.
"NOËL! NOËL!"
The cry rang out from the city walls.
Jeanne d'Arc rode into the city carrying her white banner.
The crowd lost its mind.
They surged forward, breaking the line of guards. Men and women wept openly, reaching out to touch her silver armor, her boots, her horse.
"The Maid! The Maid sent by God!"
They pressed so close that a torch held by a frantic weaver accidentally brushed against Jeanne's banner. The linen caught fire.
The crowd gasped.
Jeanne didn't panic. She spurred her horse, wheeled around, and smothered the flame with her gloved hand, extinguishing it with the grace of a veteran lancer.
"It is nothing!" she laughed, her voice clear as a bell.
The crowd roared even louder. They tried to kiss her horse's hooves. They treated her not as a soldier, but as a living relic.
Napoleon rode ten paces behind her.
No one tried to touch him.
The crowd parted for him, pressing back against the walls. They looked at him with wide, bewildered eyes. They didn't see a saint; they saw the man who had brought the thunder.
They saw the cannons dragging behind him—dark, heavy, smelling of death.
They cheered him, yes. But they didn't cheer with love. They cheered with awe.
Napoleon watched them from his saddle. He saw the difference.
Let them love her, he thought. Love is fickle. Fear and respect... that is what builds an Empire.
The Toast
The House of Jacques Boucher (Treasurer of Orléans)
10:00 PM
The banquet was not a feast of kings. It was a meal of soldiers.
The tables were piled with looted English salt beef, hard bread, and casks of wine liberated from Saint-Jean-le-Blanc. The air was thick with the smell of sweat, wine, and victory.
But there was tension.
Jean de Dunois sat at the King's right hand. He was drinking heavily. He looked at the fresh, clean armor of the new arrivals, and then at the dented, rusted plate of his own men.
Where were you? The question hung in the air. Where were you when we were eating rats?
Napoleon stood up. The room went silent. La Hire stopped chewing. Gamaches put down his cup.
Napoleon didn't go to the head of the table. He walked over to Dunois. He poured wine into the Bastard's cup with his own hand.
"I know what you are thinking," Napoleon said. His voice was not loud, but it carried to every corner of the hall. "You are thinking: The King is finally here. But you are wrong."
Dunois stiffened.
"The King is late," Napoleon said.
A gasp went through the room.
"While I sat in Chinon, you bled," Napoleon continued, looking at the scarred faces of the garrison commanders. "While I hesitated, you held the wall. You bought France time with your hunger."
He raised his cup.
"Orléans still stands because you held when I did not."
He turned to the room.
"To my cousin, Jean de Dunois—the Shield of France!"
Dunois's eyes widened. The resentment in his chest cracked and broke. He stood up, his chair scraping the floor.
"To the King!" Dunois choked out.
"Not yet," Napoleon stopped him. He turned to the bandage-wrapped figure of Raoul de Gamaches.
"To Sire de Gamaches—who taught the English that French iron is harder than their skulls!"
The knights cheered and banged the tables.
Then Napoleon raised the cup higher, his face turning solemn.
"And to Henri de Vauvilliers."
The room went quiet.
"A squire," Napoleon said softly. "He died today to save a commander. He will not see this victory. But this victory belongs to him."
"To Henri!" Napoleon roared.
"TO HENRI!" The room exploded.
Napoleon waited for the noise to die down. Then, he turned back to Gamaches. The celebratory mood shifted. The air became sharper, transactional.
"Raoul," Napoleon said. "There is one more matter between us. You hold a lion by the chain."
Everyone knew who he meant. Talbot.
"By the laws of war, the Englishman is your property," Napoleon said. "His ransom is a fortune. You could take that gold, return to Berry, buy a vineyard, and live as a wealthy lord for the rest of your days."
Gamaches shifted in his seat, looking at his hands. That was the custom. That was the dream.
"But I do not want a rich farmer," Napoleon said, his eyes locking onto the knight's. "I want a General."
He leaned forward.
"Sell him to me."
Dunois looked up sharply.
"I will buy his ransom rights from the Crown's treasury," Napoleon continued. "But I will not pay you in gold today. I will pay you in steel."
"I am forming a new company—the Compagnie d'Ordonnance (The King's Lances)," Napoleon announced. "One thousand men. Mounted, armored, and paid directly by the Crown, month by month, year by year."
"They will not answer to a Duke. They will not disband at harvest time. They will answer only to me."
Napoleon extended his hand.
"I name you Captain-General of this company. The ransom of Talbot will be your war chest. Give me the prisoner, and I will give you the finest army this kingdom has seen since Rome."
The room was deadly silent.
Dunois stared at the King. He saw the maneuver instantly. He is using the Englishman's money to bypass the feudal levy. He is building a private army right under our noses.
It was dangerous. It was unprecedented. But it was brilliant.
Gamaches looked at the King. He thought of the vineyard. Then he thought of the thunder of the charge, the weight of the lance, the feeling of breaking the English line.
He stood up. He didn't look like a man who had lost a fortune. He looked like a man who had found his purpose.
"Sire," Gamaches said, his voice rough with emotion. "Keep the gold. Give me the men, and I will give you ground."
He drew his dagger and slammed the hilt onto the table.
"Talbot is yours. My sword is yours."
"FOR FRANCE!"
This time, no one hesitated. The suspicion was gone. The separation between 'the garrison' and 'the relief force' vanished.
Dunois looked at his cousin—this stranger who wore the King's face—and raised his cup.
"FOR KING![1]" Dunois shouted.
"FOR KING! FOR KING! FOR KING!"
The chant shook the windows of the hall.
Napoleon sat down. He took a sip of the rough, stolen wine.
He looked at Jeanne, who was sitting quietly in the corner, watching him with a strange, troubled expression.
We have the army, Napoleon thought. We have the city. Now... we finish the war.
[1] FOR FRANCE!!!