The Golden Key

by Melanie Rawn

  “Do you truly know this, Rafeyo?” she demanded. “Or are you only guessing?”

  “I know it as truly as I’ve always known I’m a Limner,” he replied solemnly. “I learned something earlier this spring. I couldn’t come tell you about it because of the Confirmattio. Do you remember last year when the nephew of the Baron do’Brendizia died in prison before he could come to trial?”

  She nodded. “He killed himself rather than expose his family to such disgrace.”

  “It wasn’t suicide. A Grijalva killed him. Maybe even Lord Limner Mequel himself!”

  Involuntarily she glanced around the room as Rafeyo had done a little while ago. Heavy wood and thick brocade calmed her. “Go on.”

  “Brendizia was arrested for being drunk and disturbing the peace. But that was just an excuse. How many Courtfolk are ever thrown in jail for having a good time at a tavern? What he was really guilty of was plotting to convene the Corteis.”

  “I’d heard something of it,” Tazia said, which startled Rafeyo, just as she intended. In truth, she had heard nothing of the sort, which she had no intention of admitting to her son, and the shock of hearing it now set her heart thudding. She must pay more attention to what was being said, or she would be useless to Arrigo. She must invite more of those boring old cows to tea, strengthen her contacts among the nobility—and to do that, she must wed very soon to the nobleman of her choice.

  “Eiha,” said Rafeyo, “someone found out what he was doing. There was evidence against him. After he was arrested they searched his rooms in the city and found papers, letters, everything they’d need in a trial.”

  “Names of other conspirators?”

  “Nothing so lucky. He wasn’t very clever, but he wasn’t completely stupid either. They could’ ve tortured it out of him, though.”

  “A nobleman?” she gasped. “A Brendizia?”

  He shrugged. “A traitor is a traitor. Anyway, they could’ve tried him, and jailed him for a while, but he’d be sure to use the trial to his own purposes, denouncing Grand Duke Cossimio and calling for freedom and a legislature to assemble and so on.”

  “The baron would die of mortification,” Tazia declared with a certainty based on ten years’ acquaintance with that irascible nobleman. “If rage didn’t kill him first,” she added thoughtfully. “What a scandal. A Brendizia! Certainly they had to execute the foolish boy.”

  “Quietly. And use it to warn anybody with the same ideas,” Rafeyo finished, nodding.

  “Yes, of course, but how?”

  “Somebody painted him dead.”

  This time Tazia actually slumped into the sofa pillows, shocked beyond words.

  “It’s possible,” her son told her. “He was found dead of ‘natural causes,’ but really it was an execution. I don’t know yet how it’s done, but I’m positive it was done.” He caught her gaze, long-lidded eyes glittering. “Do you see what this means, Tazia? Do you know what we could do with this?”

  She recoiled inwardly from the fevered glee in his eyes; outwardly she merely nodded. But because he was her son, even though she had not raised him, something in him responded to what she was certain she had not revealed. He drained wine down his throat in a gulp, and spoke quickly.

  “Not really paint anybody dead, of course, but I’m sure there are things we could do, magic that would make them think what we want or do things—”

  “Yes, of course,” she said almost mindlessly.

  “Don’t you see it? That puling Princess of Arrigo’s wouldn’t stand a chance against you, Mama!”

  The word triggered something in her, something that made her brain lurch into motion again. Not maternal instinct; no, when he named her his mother, he reminded her that he and she were inextricably linked. “Rafeyo! Promise me, promise you’ll attempt nothing until you’re one of the Viehos Fratos!”

  His young face registered something akin to betrayal. “But that’ll take so long.”

  “You can wait. Rafeyo! Obey me in this! You must know everything, be as wise as you can in all the ways of Grijalva magic, before you can use it to our best advantage. What if you were caught? Worse, what if you were harmed by magic you didn’t yet fully understand? I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you. You will be Lord Limner one day, Rafeyo, don’t be impatient, don’t become the talk of the Palasso as a Neosso Irrado. It will all come to you in time, I swear it.”

  He bit his lip, no longer an ambitious young man yearning for power but a boy-child yearning for his mother’s love. “You believe in me that much?” he asked softly, almost shyly.

  It made her acutely uncomfortable, the way she’d felt when her mother Zara had brought him here just after Arrigo established her in this caza, and Rafeyo ran to her on unsteady legs crying out, “Mama!” After an awkward hug, she’d sent him to the kitchen with a servant—and told her mother to prevent similar displays in the future.

  Now she reached over to touch his wrist. “I have always believed in you.” She let her fingers trail down to his fingers, caressing them lightly, tenderly. “The hour you were born, I looked at these hands—so tiny then, so fragile, but such long, beautiful fingers!—I knew I had given birth and life to a Lord Limner greater than Mequel or Sario or even Riobaro!”

  “You did,” he replied fervently. “We both know you did. I’ll make you so proud of me.”

  “I already am. But you must promise, Rafeyo. Attempt nothing until you know precisely what it is you do.”

  “I promise.”

  After he left her, she sat quite still for some time, eyes closed, in her safe but stifling little room. I must find a way to get some air in here, it’s horrid now that summer’s coming. Telling herself that she went in search of a breeze, she locked the door behind her and went upstairs to her bedchamber, calling on the way for another bottle of wine.

  As she waited for it, she undressed, pacing, thinking of the other news of the morning: Mechella’s first appearance in Meya Suerta had been delayed. Custom dictated that a do’Verrada collect his bride, come home and introduce her to the city, then journey north to the castle of Caterrine for a period of seclusion, during which it was his duty to impregnate her. But Arrigo, sending excuses to his parents through Itinerarrio Dioniso, had taken the girl directly to Caterrine. Official gossip said it was to spare her the capital’s summer heat and stink. Unofficial gossip—always more reliable—asserted that he wanted his charming child-bride to himself for as long as possible and indeed could scarcely keep his hands off her.

  “That puling Princess of Arrigo’s wouldn’t stand a chance. …”

  Tazia slid her arms into a white silk bedrobe, knotting the sash loosely around her waist. A servant arrived with the wine and was dismissed. She stretched out on the daybed before the louvered windows, drinking Arrigo’s gift and wondering who among her Grijalva cousins she might persuade to a subtle interrogation of Dioniso. Perhaps one of her sisters, though they had all loathed each other from childhood. But she must find out if Arrigo had truly fallen in love with the girl.

  Eiha, she was supposed to want that, wasn’t she? His happiness in marriage, an advantageous alliance, Cossimio and Gizella satisfied, the people rejoicing, merchants enriched, Grijalvas entrenched at Aute-Ghillas, lots of little do’Verradas in the ducal nursery, the succession assured. It was her patriotic duty to wish Arrigo in love with his new wife.

  His blonde, beautiful, innocent, adoring, twenty-year-old wife. …

  She lay there in the coolness high above the most fashionable avenida in Meya Suerta, drinking wine and thinking about the do’Brendizia nephew painted dead in his prison cell.

  THIRTY-SIX

  Arrigo did not bring his bride to Meya Suerta until autumn. The intervening weeks were punctuated for Tazia by social calls, though not as many as had been customary during her tenure as Mistress.

  Her visitors fell into three categories. First, those who made sure she knew the latest from the lovers’ nest at Caterrine. Some gossiped to pay her bac
k for twelve years of social supremacy. Some came out of curiosity over her reaction. An innocent few, assuming her affection for Arrigo to be as generous as Lissina’s was for his father Cossimio, presumed she would want to know that her former lover was happy. The gossips, the vengeful, and the curious arrived in a state of anticipation and went away disappointed. The innocents, however, had their every expectation met: she was all smiles and sweet words for Arrigo’s newfound joy.

  The second sort of caller were admirers who, thinking her fair game now that Arrigo was well and truly wedded, wished to experience her charms personally—for private gratification or public boasting or both. These departed in frustration, not due to any overt ploy of Tazia’s but because in near-constant attendance on her was a visitor who was a category unto himself: Count Garlo do’Alva.

  He came as a suitor, and two days before the public announcement that Arrigo and Mechella would be home for Providenssia, Garlo and Tazia were quietly and privately married.

  He was a tall, personable man, at forty-seven in his late prime, his build as powerful as his stringent personal compordotta. His black hair was thickly silvered, a striking contrast to dark brown skin—which, it was rumored, he owed to more than a dollop of Tza’ab blood. He had married the great heiress Ela do’Shaarria half his life ago, gotten three sons on her, and buried her in 1260. Needing neither heirs nor riches, his requirements in a second wife were beauty, conversation, familiarity with and influence in Court politics, and sexual sophistication. Everything, in short, that he had not experienced in his first marriage. In Tazia Grijalva, he found them all and more besides.

  The newly-wed Count and Countess do’Alva journeyed north from Meya Suerta to his ancestral castello in time for Providenssia. They missed encountering the newly-wed Don Arrigo and Dona Mechella on the road by mere hours. Whether Garlo planned this to spare his bride sight of her replacement, or whether Tazia planned it to spare Arrigo’s bride sight of herself, in all quarters it was agreed that the thing was gracefully done.

  Even though it was also agreed that Tazia could have shown up naked in the road and Arrigo wouldn’t have noticed.

  Arrigo was equally adept at timing. He arrived in Meya Suerta and introduced Mechella to his people on the very day of Providenssia, in the midst of harvest celebrations. With a fine sense of the dramatic and with the connivance of the Premia Sancta, he sneaked his wife into the Cathedral Imagos Brilliantos through a side door just before his parents’ ceremonial entrance. Mechella’s first curtsy on Tira Virteian soil was thus to the living embodiments of the Mother as Provider of Grain and the Son as Crusher of Grapes: Grand Duchess Gizella in glittering ripe gold and Grand Duke Cossimio in splendid wine-red with the dark ruby ring of his ancestors glowing from his finger. If the older pair symbolized autumnal riches, young Arrigo and Mechella were the promise of next year’s spring in vivid do’Verrada blue embroidered with grape leaves (his) and new wheat (hers).

  Those lucky enough to witness the scene went wild with joy. Even the most exaggerated reports of Mechella’s blonde beauty were found to be lacking, and in a society that worshiped art she was seen to be a living masterpiece. The choirmaster, grateful for the Premia Sancta’s timely warning, signaled his hundred adolescent boys to sing “Blessed by Thy Loving Smile,” a hymn of thanksgiving more suited to nuptials than the seasonal favorite “Thy Gifts of Golden Grain.” The refrain echoed to the vaulted ceiling and the crowds outside sang along, filling all the city with music.

  After the service, the two couples walked down the nave and ascended to the Presence Balcony. The Zocalo Grando was packed; people even hung from the statue of Don Alesso do’Verrada atop the great central fountain. His descendants and their wives waved and smiled, acknowledged the cheers and singing, then toasted each other and all citizens with glasses of wine while servants in Verrada blue and junior Ecclesials in dun and brown distributed small loaves baked from this year’s first grains.

  The procession back to Palasso Verrada was on foot. The route was cleared—gently, at Cossimio’s order—by the Shagarra Regiment. Garlands and swags of leaves and sheaves were everywhere: hung from lampposts, from tiled eaves, from lintels and shop signs, from the neck of every person on the streets. Those people close enough to Mechella to exclaim in wonder at her rare, fair northern beauty also saw that while she smiled and looked about her with excitement, she seemed a little pale and clung tightly to Arrigo’s arm.

  The popular verdict: she was with child. And indeed this proved to be the case, though formal announcement did not come until that evening when the torches were lighted and a second, more boisterous procession wove through the streets, with singing and dancing and thousands of bottles of last year’s wine.

  Arrigo told his parents first, as was proper. Mechella blushed becomingly when, the moment the four were alone in the private Grand Ducal suite, he said, “Papa, Mama, I present to you Mechella—mother of your grandson!”

  “So soon?” Cossimio roared with laughter. “Quick work, boy!”

  “Isn’t that just like a man?” Gizella made a face at her husband and went forward to embrace the girl. “They think they do all the work of making a baby, when in reality their task lasts only a few minutes!”

  The Grand Duke let out a guffaw to tremble the rafters. “’Zella! Arrigo’s a strong young buck—half an hour at the least! And I know you’re not speaking from your own experience!”

  “I’ll thank you to keep a decent tongue between your teeth, Cossi!” To Mechella, who had crimsoned, she added, “Men! Eiha, carrida meya, I’ll keep you here only a little while, and then you must rest.” They sat on a velurro-covered sofa and Gizella clasped both Mechella’s hands. “Arrigo is moronno luna to have paraded you all that way among thousands of people intent on getting a look at you. You must be scared half to death.”

  “Not at all, Your Grace,” Mechella responded bravely but not quite convincingly. “I was glad to see them, and glad they wished to see me. I hope they’ll like me.”

  “Bound to,” Cossimio said, “and don’t worry your pretty head about it for an instant.” Flopping into a chair, he undid the buttons of his heavy red robes. “Matra ei Filho, this heat! Arrigo, have someone fetch us cold drinks.” As his son moved to the bellrope, he went on, “You just be your own sweet lovely self, gattina, and they’ll adore you. They ask only a smile and a kindness—’Zella can tell you all about what a Grand Duchess does, for she does it to perfection.”

  Mechella, who had never in her long-legged life been called “kitten,” smiled at her husband’s father. To her surprise, his gaze narrowed above his thick black beard and he studied her most minutely.

  “I must say,” he told her at last, “you’ve nothing to worry about in the smiling department. Your picture doesn’t half do you justice—and won’t Mequel have fits when I tell him so!” This sent him into another braying laugh, after which he glanced at Arrigo with that same taut, evaluating look. “You left a Grijalva behind at Aute-Ghillas?”

  “Itinerarrio Dioniso, to finish up some portraits. He’ll be back soon, I think.” Entry of a servant with a tray of iced drinks and small cakes interrupted him. When the family was alone once more and Gizella was busy pouring and parceling, Arrigo went on, “I think Candalio might do as the permanent Limner. He’s about my age, and very accomplished.”

  “Who? Oh, the one who painted the Deed to Caza Reccolto this spring when we gave it to—”

  “Do you prefer almond cakes or walnut, Mechella?” the Grand Duchess said smoothly.

  “Almond is my favorite,” she replied. “Grassia—no, that’s the wrong way to say ‘thank you,’ isn’t it?”

  “You’ll learn very quickly, I know,” Gizella said. “Our ‘grazzo’ does multiple duty as ‘thanks’ and ‘please’ and ‘you’re welcome’—probably because we all talk so fast we can’t be bothered with more than one word for all three concepts!”

  Mechella laughed lightly. “Most Tira Virteians do speak very quickly, like fire
works or shooting stars! And I’ve noticed that it’s because you take out syllables here—or Ghillasians add them, I’ve never discovered which. Do you know, Arrigo?”

  “Probably a little of both, ‘Chella,” he answered with a smile.

  “’Chella! What a sweet version of your name!” said the Grand Duchess. “I’d been wondering what to call you.”

  “My mother used it.”

  “You lost her a very long time ago, I know, and it’s very sad. But I hope you’ll allow me to be just a little motherly toward you, ‘Chella. I always wanted lots of daughters, but managed only one.”

  “One was enough,” Cossimio observed pointedly. “Not since Benecitta has there been a do’Verrada with a six-foot personality inside a five-foot body.”

  “I told you about Benecitta,” Arrigo said to his wife. “The great family scandal. I’ll show you her portrait in the Galerria tomorrow.”

  “Most do’Verrada women are very short,” Gizella explained further. “Our Lizia just tops five feet, and Cossi’s aunt was even smaller. I don’t know why that is, because the men are quite tall. You’ll stand out by standing up straight, carrida, and I hope your girls take after you!”

  “It might be like the Grijalva Gift,” said the Grand Duke with a shrug. “The men have it, the women don’t. Now that I think on it, Candalio isn’t the best choice for Aute-Ghillas, Arrigo. Terrible reputation with the ladies.”

  “It was only a suggestion,” Arrigo said rather stiffly.

  “Close cousin of—um, Zara Grijalva, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.” His voice was wooden now. “Of Zara Grijalva.”

  Gizella rose in a swirl of golden satin. “If you’re going to bore us with politics, we’re leaving. Come, ‘Chella. I’ll show you your rooms and you can have a nice rest before dressing for dinner. Has Arrigo explained our duties of the evening? I’m afraid we’ll be up rather late.”

  She escorted Mechella from the salon on a wave of pleasant chatter. Up a flight of stairs, down three corridors, and past a dozen Shagarra sentries, they finally reached the Heir’s private apartments.