The Golden Key (121 page)

Your devoted brother, Agustin.

She was not barren.

She was an
artist.

She chuckled. Spoken by a Limner, the words therefore became truth. Even if that Limner
was
her devoted little brother.

“
Please do not forget to burn my letters.
”

Eiha! It was past time to do so. She went to the side table, where an oil lamp stood. Lighting it, she removed the glass sleeve and stuck the first letter into the flame. It crisped swiftly and with a satisfying aroma.

“Eleyna? I smelled—” Don Rohario stopped, staring, caught
halfway into the room. Behind him, the dining room lay in serene elegance, the long ebony table and twelve matching chairs, two long sideboards inlaid with ivory and faience, and the tall windows looking out over the park. And that horrendous wallpaper. For a long moment, while the parchment flamed, she stared, seeing his beautiful clothes framed by ghastly pale cherubim fluttering through a gilt forest of vines and fanciful leaves.

“Careful!”

She laughed, dropping the scorched corner, and blew on her fingers. “Forgive me. You startled me just as I was engaged in a rather furtive activity.”

“I see.” He held the book in one hand; the cracked and dusty leather contrasted oddly with his sober morning coat and neatly-buttoned cuffs.

Of course. She had forgotten about his offer to read to her while she painted. “These are my brother’s letters. He is just fifteen. He writes everything to me and then begs me to burn his letters so no one else can read them.”

To her surprise, Rohario paled. He wandered away to the window. “I wrote poems to a girl once, when I was fifteen,” he said, without looking at her.

“Did she burn them?”

His back was to her, so she could not see his expression only the shake of his head. “My mother found them.”

“Oh.” Something in the way he said those simple words made her want to know what his mother had said and yet fear to ask. She stuck the second letter in the flame and watched it roar to a quick conclusion. Then the third. Agustin’s secrets were safe.

The silence became oppressive. Suddenly Eleyna realized how many people would have to be told about Edoard and Beatriz. Humiliation curdled in her gut.

“It must feel awkward,” said Rohario abruptly, “now that Edoard has taken your sister for his Mistress instead of you. I hope … you are not too distressed.”

“I did not truly want to be Edoard’s mistress,” she said, too quickly. “Not that I don’t like Edoard, it was my mother’s wish although I agreed—but—I just. …” She floundered. “Eiha! I’m making a fool of myself, aren’t I?”

“I don’t think so.”

She dusted the last flakes of black ash from her fingers and walked over to her portrait of Edoard. “I must finish this before the guests arrive.”

“Matra Dolcha! I had mercifully forgotten the guests. How I hate Edoard’s parties!”

“I don’t like parties either. I suppose Beatriz will be happy.”

He sighed. “I hope you will forgive me if I say that I wish I did not need to be here.”

“Why do we need to be here?” The idea came to her, as startling as it was unbidden. “I need only finish the portrait. I don’t wish to endure the ill-placed pity of your brother’s noble guests!”

“Perhaps
your
family will welcome you home, but I am not at all sure my father will want to see me.”

“Why do we have to go home at all?” It came to her with the reckless beauty of a painting done in one inspired sitting.
She did not need her family anymore, nor they her.
“I have a small inheritance set aside for me by my grandmother. Nothing much, but I could rent a room in Meya Suerta. I could make enough coin to live on, painting
Deeds
and
Wills
and
Marriages.
Many a painter does so.” But none of them were women, alone. “Of course it is impossible. It would not be safe or proper.”

She examined the portrait of Edoard. Why hadn’t she thought of it before? Painters and draughtsmen could always scratch out a living. If she could find wealthier clients … but a young woman without father or brother or husband to protect her was fair game in the rough world outside palasso walls.

She spun to face Rohario.
Why not
? It was risky, of course, but there came a time in life when you had to shut your eyes and leap forward on faith. The audacity of the idea dazzled her. She could not live alone and friendless in Meya Suerta—unless she had a companion, someone safe, a
brother.

  SIXTY-EIGHT  

Agustin
Grijalva sat in one of the stuffy attic closets crammed into the storeroom beyond the Atelierro and tried not to breathe. If he took in too deep a gulp of the stale air, he would cough helplessly. That had happened three days ago, when he had tried this for the first time, and he had barely escaped being caught. Now he fortified himself with a pouch of water and an infusion of fennel in honey.

The plank floor was cold and uncomfortable. His skin ached. He had gotten a terrible rash yesterday, but a salve of aloe had soothed the worst of the stinging pain. Despite that pain, Agustin bent his entire will upon the rectangle of parchment, prepared with oil from his fingers, that he had propped up on his bent knees against a thin piece of wood. At this awkward angle, his neck hurt. His skin pulled and burned. Probably he was going to get blisters all over.

But he did not move. He stared at the detailed sketch, bordered with an elaborate skein of symbols that he had drawn onto the parchment using pen and ink mixed with the tincture of his own blood.

He looked at a drawing of the long table that sat at the far end of the Atelierro. The setting sun shone, casting barred shadows along the table, just as he had observed it to do at the seventh hour after midday. At this hour, on the occasion of the Great Feasts of the year, the Grijalva Conselhos met. Once the Conselhos had been only the most senior Limners; now they included any family member, even women, made senior by age or influence.

Agustin intended to spy on them. He prayed to Matra ei Filho that it would work.

He knew he could never sketch every person in correctly, or even guess in what arrangement they might sit at the table, so he had only sketched in the table and the shadows. If he could catch the lighting just right and trigger the spell before the Conselhos assembled, then he could listen in on the whole thing. But was the sketch accurate enough? He had studied Eleyna’s drawings—the ones she had sent him from Chasseriallo—with the greatest care, but she had seven years of training beyond him as well as the better eye. Still, he had done his best to place the shafts of light as they
would fall over the wood grain, illuminate the highbacked chairs, touch that one square of plush Tza’ab carpet.

“
That is the test of magic
,” Zio Giaberto had said. “
For a spell to be triggered, the rendering must be perfect. Nothing else will do.
”

“
What if a man is Gifted with magic but not with the ability to draw
?” Agustin had asked.

“
Then his Gift is worthless. But while there are greater and lesser talents, I know of only three cases in our long history of Gifted males who simply could not learn to use their Gift. With enough drilling and practice, even a child with little natural aptitude for art will suffice as a copyist and can serve the family by performing certain routine duties which still demand the use of magic but not, perhaps, any great artistic talent. But do not worry, Agustin, you are not one of those sorry few. Your talents are evident.
”

“
Eleyna should have had my Gift
,” he had said recklessly.

“
I am not interested in having this discussion again, mennino. Your devotion to your sister is admirable but misplaced. Continue with the recitation.
”

Recite he had, and did now, words from the
Folio
, to seal the magic, to trigger it. Whispering to himself helped him not to cough. But as he waited, the air grew thicker and thicker by some agency he could not know. Then, as if melded with the air, whispers floated to him.

“…
Cabral will vote against us again … too much influence … isn’t Gifted, but always had the favor of the Grand Duke … hush, here come the others.
…”

A confused jumble of soft noise. Agustin unfroze himself. His shoulders ached. No one was standing outside the closet door, trading secrets. The magic had worked.

“
Greetings, cousins. We are gathered here to toast the Feast of Imago with this very fine Palenssia red. I know there is dispute at the Ecclesia about whether the Exalted were pruning back vines destined to produce a white or a red when they were visited with the Image of Matra ei Filho, but I trust we may give thanks to Their Blessed Visitassion with any fine vintage and leave the quibbling to the scholars.
”

Shared chuckles. Agustin did not get the joke, and in any case, he was annoyed. He could not see anyone. Surely this spell was supposed to allow him to
see
as well as
hear
the Conselhos.
Merditto!
Eleyna would have done it right. She had helped him with the dream spells, relating to him the secrets of Grijalva magic
that Grandmother Leilias had told her. It had all made sense to
her.
The only time he ever felt as if he could manage what was going on was when he tried to think as he supposed she would.

Eiha! Hearing would have to serve. Of course that was Lord Limner Andreo giving the first toast. But Agustin desperately wondered who else was there—Grandzio Cabral, according to the whisperers he had first heard. But their voices had been so muffled that he could not identify them.

“…
before we adjourn for the service at the Cathedral, I do have a piece of unexpected news to impart. I have just received a courier from Chasseriallo.
…”

“
Matra ei Filho! Has there been some disaster
?”

“
Now, now, Nicollo. Let us not look at things in the worst light always. Let us say instead there has been a change of plans.
”

“
I’ll kill her.
” That was Agustin’s mother, definitely.

“
You needn’t worry, Dionisa.
” Even through the muffling effect of magic and parchment, Agustin could tell Andreo was as amused as he was irritated. “
At least one of your daughters knows her duty to the family.
”

“
Beatriz!
”

So many voices, speaking at once, and laughter.

“
Matra Dolcha, Cabral, have you no shame
?” Dionisa again. “
Beatriz has not been protected, she is still so young—and she is fertile!
”

“
Leilias will have taught her everything she needs to know. I see I underestimated those girls.
”

“
Cabral is right.
” This was Andreo once more. “
Eleyna was the better choice for many reasons, but clearly not the choice Edoard made.
”

“
She pushed Beatriz into it, I just know she did! And I will have her whipped when I get my hands on her! Matra! I’ll whip her myself!
”

“
I assure you, Dionisa, Beatriz will bear no children by Edoard. Now recall this: The Marria do’Fantome has been restored.
That
is the important thing.
”

Eleyna was not Don Edoard’s mistress. Beatriz was.

Agustin choked. He gulped for air, groped for the cup of water, tipped it over, and dropped the parchment as he broke into racking coughs.

Through the haze of gulping for air he heard their voices continuing, a shift in topic but one he could not follow. He desperately tried to catch his breath. What would they do to Eleyna?

“In here, I think.” These words did not come through the parchment.

The closet door opened and he blinked up, still hacking, at Giaberto and, beyond him, at the snow-white hair and bland, seamed face of Cabral.

“Get the boy something to drink,” snapped Giaberto as he snatched up the parchment.

Cabral pushed Giaberto aside and pulled Agustin to his feet. “Now, now, mennino. I want you to listen to my voice. Listen to my breathing. When I breathe—like so—”