The War Room at the Tuileries had become the headquarters of the Apocalypse.
Maps covered every surface. Stacks of requisitions teetered on chairs. The air was thick with tobacco smoke and the smell of aggressive coffee.
I sat at the head of the table.
To my right sat Georges Danton, Minister of Justice. He was eating a sausage with his bare hands, dropping crumbs on a list of potential execution victims.
To my left sat Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, Minister of Foreign Affairs. He was sipping wine, looking elegant and bored, as if the end of the world were a tedious dinner party.
Standing at the map was Napoleon Bonaparte, Minister of War. He was vibrating with energy, moving wooden blocks across the border of France.
This was my Cabinet. A demagogue, a snake, and a warlord.
And me. The Accountant King.
"The situation is simple," Talleyrand said, sliding a dispatch across the table. "Emperor Leopold is furious. He demands the immediate release of his sister, the restoration of her household, and a public apology for the death of Count Fersen."
"He can have an apology attached to a cannonball," Danton grunted, chewing.
"If we refuse," Talleyrand continued, ignoring Danton, "Prussia joins Austria. They have mobilized 80,000 men on the Rhine. They will invade within the month."
"Let them come," Napoleon said, not looking up from the map. "Their supply lines are overextended. I can cut them at the Meuse."
"With what?" Talleyrand asked. "Our army is a mob with muskets. The officers have fled. We have no boots. We have no powder."
"We have twenty million Frenchmen," Danton said. "Give them a pike and tell them the Germans are coming to eat their children. They'll fight."
"Spirit is not logistics," I said. "We need money. Real money. Not paper Assignats."
I looked at Danton.
"The prisons," I said. "How many?"
"Three thousand," Danton said. "Mostly aristocrats caught trying to flee. Some priests. A few unlucky journalists."
"And you want to guillotine them?"
"It cleans the rear," Danton shrugged. "We can't fight a war on the border if we have traitors in Paris. Kill them all. Strike terror into the hearts of the Royalists."
"Dead men don't pay taxes," I said.
Danton paused, a piece of sausage halfway to his mouth. "What?"
"We are broke, Georges," I said. "Executing a Duke costs money. You have to pay the executioner, the cart driver, the grave digger. It's a net loss."
I pulled a sheet of paper from my portfolio.
"I propose a new policy. The Patriot Tax."
"Tax?" Danton frowned. "You can't tax prisoners."
"We ransom them," I said.
The room went quiet.
"We set a price list," I explained, channeling my old corporate liquidation strategies. "A Duke is worth 100,000 livres. A Marquis, 75,000. A simple Chevalier, 10,000. If their families pay—in gold or silver, not paper—we release them. They get a passport to England or America. They leave, and they never come back."
Talleyrand's eyes lit up. He appreciated the cynicism.
"And if they don't pay?" Talleyrand asked.
I looked at Danton.
"Then the Minister of Justice can have his terror."
Danton laughed. It was a deep, belly-shaking sound.
"You are selling their lives back to them!" Danton roared. "It's extortion!"
"It's revenue," I corrected. "We are liquidating bad assets to fund the acquisition of new territory."
"It's brilliant," Talleyrand murmured. "The families will pay. They will melt down their jewelry to save their fathers. We could raise millions in a week."
"Do it," I ordered Danton. "Post the price list in the prisons tomorrow. First come, first served. Make them compete for their freedom."
Danton wiped his greasy hands on his breeches. "You are a cold bastard, Louis. I like it."
"Now," I said, turning to the map. "The invasion."
"Defense, you mean," Talleyrand corrected.
"No," I said. "Offense."
Talleyrand choked on his wine. "Sire? You want to attack? With this army?"
"If we wait, we lose," I said. "If we let them cross the border, the war is fought on French soil. Our farms burn. Our cities starve. The people will turn on us."
I stood up and walked to the map. I pointed to the Austrian Netherlands—modern-day Belgium.
"We export the chaos," I said. "We invade Belgium. We declare it a war of liberation. We tell the Belgians we are coming to free them from the Austrian tyrant."
"We loot their treasuries," Napoleon added, smiling. "Belgium is rich. Churches full of gold."
"Exactly," I said. "We feed the war with the war."
"It's madness," Talleyrand whispered. "All of Europe will unite against us."
"They already have," I said. "We are just striking first."
I looked at Napoleon.
"Can you do it, Captain?"
Napoleon looked at the wooden blocks. He moved a French block across the border.
"The army is raw," he said. "They don't know how to march in columns. They can't maneuver."
"So don't maneuver," I said. "Swarm."
"Swarm?"
"Use the numbers," I said. "Give them the new anthem. Give them the Tricolor. Tell them they are the army of God and Liberty. Send them in a wave. Overwhelm the professional Austrian lines with sheer fanaticism."
Napoleon's eyes narrowed. He was calculating the physics of fanaticism.
"It will be bloody," he said. "High casualties."
"But will we win?"
Napoleon grinned. "If they don't run out of bullets before we run out of men... yes."
"Good," I said. "Draft the order."
Just then, the doors burst open.
It wasn't a messenger. It was a sound.
A roar from outside. Like the ocean during a hurricane.
"What is that?" Talleyrand asked, looking nervous.
I walked to the balcony. I opened the doors.
The noise hit me like a physical blow.
Below, in the Tuileries courtyard and spilling out into the streets, were thousands of people. Torches flickered like a sea of fire.
They weren't rioting. They were waiting.
They had heard the rumors of war. They were scared. They were angry. They needed to know if they were going to die.
I stepped out onto the balcony.
Danton followed me. Then Napoleon.
When the crowd saw me, the roar changed pitch. It became a question.
"CITIZENS!" I shouted. My voice echoed off the stone walls.
"The Kings of Europe have threatened us!"
"BOOOO!" the crowd screamed.
"They demand we return to chains!" I yelled. "They demand we give up our liberty! They demand we apologize for being free!"
"NEVER!"
"They are gathering their armies at the border!" I shouted, gripping the railing. "They want to burn Paris! They want to kill your children!"
I paused. I let the fear sink in.
Then I gave them the antidote.
"But we will not wait for them!" I roared. "We will not cower behind walls!"
I drew my sword. It flashed in the torchlight.
"Tonight, I declare that France is at war with Tyranny! We march north! We march to liberate our brothers in Belgium! We march to Vienna if we have to!"
The crowd exploded.
"TO THE RHINE! TO THE RHINE!"
It was a frenzy. A religious ecstasy.
I had given them a target. I had turned their fear into aggression.
I looked at Napoleon.
He wasn't looking at the crowd. He was looking at the map of Europe in his mind, calculating angles, supply lines, artillery vectors.
"I'm going to need more cannons," he whispered to me.
"You'll get them," I said. "Just win."
I looked back at the crowd.
I had started a world war to save my own neck. Millions would die. The map of the world would be redrawn in blood.
But as the cheers washed over me, I didn't feel guilty.
I felt powerful.
I was the CEO of the Apocalypse. And business was booming.