The Golden Key

by Melanie Rawn

  Looking half-dubious and half-thrilled, the boy walked over to the windows and craned his neck to look out.

  “That was well seen of you,” said Giaberto, “knowing that to praise the boy’s curiosity would allow you to warn him about the dangers of our magic.”

  Well seen! Sario eyed the other Limner with misgiving. Had Giaberto not had similar thoughts himself as a boy? Had he not experimented? There were always some sorry boys who did only what they were told. Giaberto had not struck him as that kind.

  Giaberto Grijalva was about thirty-eight. He might live under the thumb of his twin sister, the elder by one hour, but it wouldn’t do to underestimate him; he and Dionisa clearly shared the same ambitions. No doubt being born twinned with a Gifted brother made Dionisa more likely to give birth in her turn to Gifted sons. With two more boys in the nursery and four living daughters, she was a force to be reckoned with.

  “For my part I have seen that you have talent,” continued Giaberto unctuously. Sario recognized the tactic: By such means did aspirants for Lord Limner woo possible allies. “You could go far—but not if you antagonize Andreo and Nicollo.”

  “They no longer understand art!”

  “There, you see? I do not myself care for this new, emotional style you are championing. It doesn’t have dignity, nor suitable exactitude. But I am not blind to my niece Eleyna’s talent, which is considerable, even while the others ignore it. I can see that you, too, have a strong, original style. But your mother is dead and you have been outside the Viehos Fratos for eight years. You didn’t endure the Fever that decimated our family. You are still accounted an outsider. Defer to your elders until you have formed more influential ties.”

  If you only knew, you would never dare speak to me like this! You would be on your knees, begging me to teach you even one tenth of the knowledge I have hoarded away over the centuries—

  “Sario!”

  The sound of his name—his real name—still had the power to startle him. As he turned, he caught sight of himself in the mirror. He froze. Who was that ordinary-looking man who stared back at him? That wasn’t Sario!

  Of course it wasn’t. It was merely flesh. He regretted, again, not choosing the other boy—what had his name been? Alerrio, yes, that was it. At least he had been a handsome youth, and Sario was tired of the bland face of his current host; at best it served to make his companions believe he was innocuous. But Alerrio was one of the many Grijalvas who had succumbed to the Summer Fever.

  “Sario, I am pleased to have a chance to talk with you at last.” Andreo stopped and nodded briskly at Giaberto, who immediately excused himself and went off to supervise Agustin’s work. “I will come to the point. Grand Duke Renayo finds your style undisciplined. He does not want you to paint the Treaty with Merse. However—”

  “But no one can do as well with that Treaty as I can. I have visited the court! I have conversed with Queen Agwyn—a difficult woman to paint. The rest of you would have to work from my sketches—”

  “Sario! I have not done speaking!”

  Once, as Riobaro, he would have spoken in the same way to an overly-eager young Limner. The irony did note scape him.

  “The sketches you did of the young noblewomen did please His Grace,” Andreo continued. “He wants you to do a new set of them, unadorned, painted. He intends to make a choice within these six months for a bride for Don Edoard and then open negotiations. He favors Princess Alazais de Ghillas, so you may be asked to add a suggestion to her portrait, suggestion that could act subtly on Edoard. If you comport yourself circumspectly and paint as befits a Grijalva, you may be allowed to do work on the Betrothal and to do some of the composition for the Marriage.”

  “If I refuse?”

  “If you cannot work within the confines of Court life?” Andreo shrugged. “Your work as an Itinerarrio was excellent, your communications invaluable. I am only sorry you left Ghillas before the troubles there erupted. Then we would have had your witness to the events. As it is, the Grand Duke’s agents bring home a different story every day. We have had a second report that King Ivo was killed by the mob. What has the world come to?” He made a clucking sound, rather like a hen.

  A hen, indeed. More like a bantam cock, in these ridiculous new fashions that could not decide whether they wanted to be as plain as a common bricklayer’s working clothes or as tarted up as a whore’s, square cuts with cheap bright colors! But Sario forced himself to speak calmly. “I am not permitted to do Treaties or any paintings destined for the Galerria, then?”

  “Some Itinerarrios are not fit for Court work. It is up to you to prove yourself, Sario, and to please the Grand Duke. There are other men waiting their turn, whose skills are superior to yours and who have labored hard here with the family to increase our fortunes.”

  Whose skills were superior! It was all Sario could do not to spit in Lord Limner Andreo’s smug face. It was clear, abundantly clear, that he had done well to prepare a second line of defense. Oh, he had been sure they would welcome him home, give him the position due him, shower him with praise, accept his superior claims … but he had learned to leave a bolt-hole, to hold secrets in reserve.

  “Perhaps I would prefer to return to Itinerarrio service. It might be well to gain exact information of the troubles that have racked Ghillas and Taglis and Niapali. What do the learned doctors call it? A plague of restlessness. What of the rest of the royal family of Ghillas, for instance?”

  Andreo shrugged. “Reports are mixed. They only agree on King Ivo’s death, and that the palace was stormed.”

  “That does not speak well for the fate of Queen Iriene and the daughter, Alazais. A pretty girl.” Sario watched Andreo’s face closely, but the mention of Alazais made no impact.

  “You may be assured that Grand Duke Renayo is concerned about the fate of Princess Alazais. You are aware, of course, that the late King Enrei named his nephew Renayo as his heir.”

  Aware of it! As Dioniso he brought it about by making sure Enrei would sire no children. “But the Ghillassian noblemen had other ideas.” That was the trouble with noblemen: there were always too many of them and they always wanted their own way. They had thrown their weight behind then-Prince Ivo, whom they rightly judged would be a weak king. But Ivo’s weakness had led to his downfall at the hands of the mob.

  Andreo gestured dismissively. “Pluvio en laggo. Now, however, the situation has changed. Don Edoard’s claim is doubly strong, through Grand Duchess Mairie, blessed be her memory. If Edoard marries Alazais … well, should you bring news of the princess, I am sure Grand Duke Renayo would look more favorably upon your painting.”

  “Let me consider for a day,” said Sario. “I might prefer to return to Itinerarrio service. Regretto— If you will excuse me.”

  He gave Andreo a curt nod and left, walking down the length of the Atelierro. Here, now, all of the Limners congregated and did most of their paintings; it was considered uncivil and indeed rather odd for a Limner to paint in the privacy of his own personal atelierro. At least the space itself was well-lit and comfortable. It was a huge chamber, filled with light from windows ranged along both sides, one set looking out over the street, the other over the courtyard. Oak beams bridged the ceiling, and great timber supports made an aisle down the center of the hall. These supports were so massive they were used as the portrait gallery of the masters. On each of the four sides of the huge pillars of wood hung one of the self-portraits of the Gifted Grijalva painters, a Galerria of the family line. The portraits of the living Limners resided in the Crechetta, of course. But once a painter died, his portrait was either consigned to the storage attic—if he had contributed no greater gift than service to the family—or displayed here, in the Atelierro.

  Down the centuries Sario walked, looking up into eyes that were familiar to him, men he had known, liked, hated, battled. Men who had been himself.

  He stared back at himself, in almost a dozen fine portraits: Arriano, Dioniso, Ettoro (his brilliant career cut sh
ort by acute bone-fever), Oaquino. Thank the Mother that Renzio had been put into the attic. He did not want to look into that homely face again. Even Domaos had been left in the Galerria, as an object lesson for Grijalva boys who grew too attached to women beyond their touch. And there, Riobaro, his great masterpiece of a life, that magnificent candlelit self-portrait surrounded by the gold frame marking him as Lord Limner. Timirrin, generous Matteyo, even Guilbarro who had lived so short a time but painted so brilliantly. Verreio, Martain, Zandor—and the first, Ignaddio.

  And there, almost next to the door, he stopped and looked at his own face. He had almost forgotten how brightly he shone, how intense. No wonder Saavedra loved him.

  If only that damned Alejandro hadn’t gotten in the way. … He shook himself free of the old anger. No matter. Saavedra was safe. She would always be safe; she was waiting for him. It just wasn’t time yet. He had work to do.

  As he went out the door and started down the steps, he passed Davo, who was climbing to the Atelierro with a confused expression on his seamed old face.

  Out on the street Sario walked slowly, musing. That was the advantage of age. He understood the necessity of planning, of being prepared, of having options. He had learned better than to think that his influence would be equal in every life. Often he had to start from scratch. Even with careful planning, there were bound to be mistakes. He ought to have chosen Alerrio, for instance, not succumbed to the urge to take his own name back again. Then Alerrio would not have been in Meya Suerta when the Fever struck, would not have died; Alerrio’s family had been grooming him for the position of Lord Limner.

  He should never, as Domaos, have taken up with Benecitta do’Verrada, heartless creature that she was. He should not have chosen Renzio, that graceless oaf. And Rafeyo! That had been a disaster barely recovered from. That was the risk with every life, that something lay in wait he could not predict. That the bloodlines would not be stable. That an accident might happen, unforeseen. That the Viehos Fratos would not give him his due.

  That he would be, again and always, alone.

  Sario wasn’t in the mood for waiting, not in this life. Arriano had been patient. Now it was time to act.

  He barely noticed the city, quiet after the hangings two days ago. His feet took him by remembered ways to the wine shop and up the stairs to his atelierro, hedged in by painted spells. He barely glanced at his Peintraddo Memorrio. Instead he went directly to the bed and pulled his traveling chest out from underneath. He unlocked it and lifted the heavy lid.

  Inside were clothes, an ancient silk robe packed in paper, his skull wrapped in velvet, and a scrap of cloth from one of Saavedra’s gowns. Tucked into one corner was a smaller wooden chest, the length of his forearm and about half that wide. Carefully, he lifted it out and set it on the table.

  Standing, he unlocked it and, reverently, lifted the lid.

  He had lied to them, of course. It didn’t do to be too free with vital information.

  Lying on top was a heavy gold seal ring bearing the quartered arms of the Ghilasian royal family. Below it lay a length of pale gold velurro wrapped around a short, stubby object. Beside this rested several small caskets, some of them jeweled because such things were what had been at hand when he had needed them, and tiny glass vases wrapped in rich burgundy velurro, smelling of sweet clover.

  If the Grand Duke controlled all, then it would be necessary to control the Grand Duke.

  It had been tried—once and only once—to make the Duke a puppet. Had that been the first Clemenzo or the second? He could not recall. Lord Limner Alfonso had conceived of the idea of making the Duke speak, think, indeed act only as the Grijalva Limners willed it. Sario—he had been Zandor then—had told them the experiment would fail, and it had.

  After two days the court physicians had proclaimed Clemenzo ill with a sickness of the mind because of his disjointed speech and jerky movements, because he quite suddenly had no knowledge of a horse’s fine points or of military tactics and would lapse at intervals into a stupor. The Viehos Fratos had destroyed the painting and arrogant Alfonso along with it. But experiments were always useful because they tested the limits of power.

  It was one thing, say, to cause a woman to fall in love with a man; that changed the rest of her not at all. Suggestion spells acted on only one part of a person’s mind, usually the part ruled by emotion and impulse. A human being was an infinitely complex creature, full of subtleties that the boldest paint strokes could not duplicate … except in the hands of a master. But he was getting ahead of himself.

  Sario had manipulated Duke Alejandro perfectly well without the aid of magics and paints. After all, he and Alejandro gave each other mutual benefit and aid. Both families prospered. So had the alliance of do’Verrada and Grijalva continued over the centuries.

  And yet all was not well in Meya Suerta. Weakness had crept in: The Grijalvas deteriorated, the do’Verradas were useless, and this plague of restlessness endangered everything they had built. A master’s hand was needed to correct things. As Lord Limner he could act swiftly. The Grand Duke named the next Lord Limner. And to control the Grand Duke, one must possess what he most wished to gain.

  Sario opened up one of the jeweled caskets. Nestled against the ivory silk lining, the rich golden strands of hair had lost none of their luster. In a smaller compartment, shut off by a second lid, the darker, thicker pubic hairs clustered, crooked and short, and next to them the wispier hairs gleaned from arm and leg.

  He closed the lid and set this little casket to one side.

  It was true that a mob had stormed the palace in Aute-Ghillas. The furious crowd had not even pretended, as they reportedly had in Taglis, to give a mock judicial legitimacy to their rampage. They had gathered up muskets, shovels, pitchforks, and butcher knives and overrun the palace guard, not even noticing their own dead as they fell in swathes or were trampled beneath the surging crowd. Evidently they found it a small price to pay for their revenge.

  He had put the eyelashes in a separate jewelbox, because they were so delicate, so easily lost, and so rare. The fingernails and toenails he had put in a cruder box, made of wood; they did not need such careful treatment. Dried blood still adhered to them.

  He had had enough warning (one could scarcely fail to hear the mob) to sketch a suggestion spell on himself. “There’s no one here.” The mob’s collective mind had been easy to sway, although the spell itself had been hasty: they never noticed him. They were too intent on their real prey.

  There were only five glass vials of blood left. The sixth, alas, had broken in the escape out of the chaos that had gripped Aute-Ghillas. But five would be enough. The blood moved sluggishly when he tipped the vials, one by one, but the essence of sweet clover he had added kept it from coagulating.

  So he had stood shielded by the shadows he had cast over their minds, stood half screened by a tapestry in the royal hall, and watched the mob murder the royal family. Rend them to pieces, more like, the royal family and those dog-loyal retainers who had stood with them to the end.

  King Ivo had been dragged away, to be displayed on a pike from one of the windows overlooking the gardens and drive. Poor Queen Iriene, an inoffensive woman in all regards, had simply vanished among the corpses.

  Sario wasn’t sure whether the mob had actually meant to kill Princess Alazais, beloved of the court, the only and lateborn fruit of her parents. But they had killed everyone indiscriminately and she had been tossed just as indiscriminately in among the bodies of her ladies-in-waiting, young women as innocent and stupid and pampered as she was. None had been as beautiful, but beauty is no protector from improvident death.

  He unrolled a length of fabric. Within it lay silks torn from finely sewn underrobes, and on those silks he had done rubbings of two palms and the soles of two feet. The journey had not smudged them. He had been careful to set them with chalk. A slight powder still clung to them. He lay them beside the casket filled with golden hair.

  Once the mob had pou
red onward, eager to display King Ivo’s body to their assembled brethren on the lawns outside, Sario had ventured forward to dig through the heap of corpses left in the throne room.

  After so many years of life, he had learned never to let any opportunity go by—not such a one as this, knowing, as he did, the long and convoluted relationship between Tira Virte and Ghillas, knowing that Grijalvas and do’Verradas had schemed between them to make of Tira Virte a great kingdom, built out of the bodies of many smaller provinces.

  What did Renayo want? He wanted Ghillas, a huge new jewel to add to Tira Virte’s luster.

  Sario was going to give it to him.

  He took a gem-studded casket purloined from the music room in the Pallaiso Millia Luminnai and opened it. He had put cloves inside to mask the smell, but a faint scent of putrefaction touched his nostrils nonetheless. Here were scraps from a white linen shift and scrapings of skin, no longer as pale as they had been two months ago, nor as supple. It had been a hasty job.

  He unrolled velvet to uncover fingerbones. On the trip south he had managed to boil these, scouring away flesh and skin and blood—he had enough of that elsewhere—so they showed white against the black lushness of the velvet.

  For a long while he studied the remains. The clock on the mantelpiece ticked loudly behind him and, at the half hour, chimed.