by Melanie Rawn
“I am finished.” Wiping chalk off her hands, she gave her sketch one last angry glance, as if to make it alter by magic, then made her excuses and left the room. The servant followed her out. In the corridor, he handed her the folded paper. She opened it.
Dearest Eleynita
Terrible news. Lord Limner Andreo died three days ago, we still don’t know if it was some kind of plague, but no one else has sickened at all except Nicollo took a turn for the worse yesterday and we fear for his life as well. No one knows what to do. They pretend they do, but I can tell they are all frightened. No one dares go out on the streets. Follow carefully these directions, and perhaps we can talk to each other. First send me a sketch of your bedchamber drawn at dawn. Change nothing in your room, only place the little painting I drew here on a table, somewhere you can sit in perfect stillness and observe it, and mark on your drawing where it is to be placed. Then at dawn, when all the shadows are the same, you must sit there. Only be patient. If I redraw your sketch with my own blood and place it where my sketch was drawn from, it should be possible for us to speak to one another. On no account burn this letter or the little painting. Perhaps you wonder how we have gotten this in to you? Eiha! Your admirer assists us. He has agreed to go to Palasso Verrada to deliver it. Do as I ask.
Your devoted brother, Agustin. Please remember you must NOT burn this letter! You will know why.
She pressed the paper against her breast. Agustin must have put his own blood into the tiny oil painting—which was a perfect rendition of a corner of the Atelierro. The shadows were pale, suggesting dawn.
Finally, recovering herself, she looked up to see the servant waiting patiently for her.
“Don Rohario wishes to see you,” he said quietly. “He went in to see the Grand Duke—
So little time! She could not know how long Rohario would be inside the Palasso. “I must go by my chambers. Come with me.”
She ran. The servant waited discreetly outside while she went through her drawings, searching for one made at dawn. Picking one, she studied it, then quickly and deftly sketched in the paper as it would look laid flat on her sidetable. She memorized the exact position of everything there. Looked it all over once again. Yes, that was perfect. As perfect as the glints on the bells Sario had drawn on her sketch. She rolled the sketch up into a tube, rolled a sheet of paper around it, and tied it with a string.
The servant’s face remained blandly imperturbable. “This way, Maessa.” She might never have known there was need for haste.
He led her by indirect, narrow passageways—the private halls for the servants, she realized—to the great winding stairs leading up to the Grand Duke’s study. At the top of the stairs the landing opened into an anteroom, neatly appointed with a latticework sidetable inlaid with ivory carvings and four Sevris chairs built of pale wood, seatcovers embroidered with sapphire starbursts. Two doors, one ajar, opened off the anteroom.
“In here, grazzo.” The servant led her to the door that stood ajar. She paused under the threshold. Inside was a long black table with many chairs. This was a council room, although it was empty now. Two small windows let in light.
At that moment, the door that led into the Grand Duke’s study was thrown open.
“—and never come back! You are no son of mine!”
A slender young man backed out into the anteroom. The door was slammed shut in his face. There was only silence as the hard sound shuddered like a living thing in the air and then faded. A soldier shuffled nervously down the steps.
“My lord.” The servant spoke softly, but the young man started as at an explosion and jerked around.
The servant pressed Eleyna into the council room. An instant later Rohario entered. The door was closed softly behind him. He gaped at her. He looked stunned. A low noise she had not noticed before penetrated her awareness: The sound of the city beyond. It had a muttering, restless quality. It was also getting dark.
“Rohario,” she said, and was amazed to hear his name emerge clearly from her lips.
“He wants me to marry Princess Alazais,” he blurted out. “He took the list of grievances from my hand and burned it in the fireplace. Said he didn’t need to read the rantings of the mob. But there were men at the assembly he has received here at Court. Men who have appeared in Treaties they helped negotiate. Then he told me that I will marry Princess Alazais and become King of Ghillas.”
Eleyna felt as if she had been groping in a cloud, only to find a sharp stone.
“Of course I said I would not.” He gave a hoarse laugh. “I don’t want to be a king. A year ago perhaps I would have agreed to it, but—Matra Dolcha, Eleyna. Is that truly you?”
“Yes. I am truly here.”
He grasped one of her hands, then lifted her fingers to his lips Kissed them, while searching her eyes with his own.
“You will marry me, won’t you? I don’t have anything to offer you by way of title, not now. I’m cast in forever with the Corteis.” His grim smile covered a tension as brittle as an old Limner’ bones. “But I have two estates. No one, not even my father, can take them from me. Say you will marry me and none of the rest will matter.”
Sario will never allow it.
Eiha! She struggled free of her obligation to Sario Grijalva, on her duty to the Grijalvas. She struggled to see Rohario without any veil in front of her eyes, as a painter might.
Hazel eyes, from his mother. His father’s light brown hair. A narrow, delicate face made strong by the stubborn line of his jaw and the subtle shading of iron resolve in his eyes. Slight of build he had gained in these last months a vitality that lent him statures And of course the absolute perfection of his clothing. Let no one ever say that Rohario do’Verrada was not the best-dressed man on his time.
She laughed, and yet there were tears in the laughter. Leaning forward into his embrace, she stood holding him close, feeling his lips on her hair. She was aware of him, of his physical body, the light pressure of his breath, his arms tight around her back, in an all most painfully immediate way, solid, textural, and very much here She wanted to be close to him. She wanted to be closer still. Old unwanted memories made her flush, for the shame of what had happened between her and Felippo.
And yet … that old shame could not come between them. I could not tarnish the bright warmth of what they had now.
“Regretto. My lord. I must escort you out. If the Grand Duke finds you still here….”
Rohario sighed hard against her, then wrenched himself away pausing to kiss her on the forehead. His hand tightened on hers until her fingers hurt.
“Corasson meya,” he murmured and let her go.
She handed him the rolled up sketch without a word. He took it and left.
“If I marry any man, Rohario do’Verrada,” she said under he breath, “it will be you.”
It took her a long time to regain her composure and longer still to get up enough nerve to venture out of the council room. The old chanticleer clock on the table chimed the hour, and the chanticleer flapped its wings. It was almost too dark to see in the unlit room. She slipped out of the room, crept down the stairs by the light of torches newly posted along the walls. No one remarked on her presence. In a daze, she returned to the atelierro.
The chamber was empty except for Princess Alazais, her three faithful attendants, and Sario. By candlelight he added the final glazes and frotties to a fine portrait of Grand Duke Renayo. It was beautifully composed: Renayo stood on a trimmed lawn, under a peach tree, holding flax in his hands. How odd. Grandmother Leilias’s teaching leaped unbidden into her thoughts. Flax for Fate. Grass for Submission.
Submission.
She went cold all at once.
Of course it was a ridiculous thought. The Grijalvas worked in concert with the do’Verradas. The Grand Duke kept the portrait of the Lord Limner in his study, so that he might—eiha! Eleyna did not know the details of what exactly he might do. But she could guess. She was just imagining things. Letting her mother’s
betrayal poison her opinion of everyone else. Sario was giving her everything she most desperately wanted.
Everything except Rohario, of course. But if she returned to Palasso Grijalva, she would be a prisoner again. She shook her head, trying to throw off all these terrible thoughts. It was only the shock of Andreo’s death. That was all. Alazais sat with her usual uncanny stillness, embroidering by lamplight.
At last Eleyna made her feet move, one at a time, and walked over to the Limner.
“Master Sario.” She swallowed. Forced the words out. “I have just had word from Palasso Grijalva. Lord Limner Andreo is dead.”
“Yes,” he said. “Tomorrow I wish you to find the inventory for the Galerria. I want you to record which paintings survive and still remain in the Galerria by Riobaro Grijalva, by Dioniso, Arriano, Ettoro, Domaos—no, not Domaos—Oaquino, Guilbarro, Martain, Zandor, Ignaddio, Verreio, Matteyo, Timirrin, Renzio … Eiha! Renzio! What an oaf! Those which are in storage you will have brought out again.”
He dismissed this earth-shattering news so blithely that she floundered. “Only those? There are so many others, Sario—”
“Sario! Of course Sario! I will admit Tazioni and Aldaberto as well. And Benedetto. A fine eye for colors had Benedetto. Begin with those. You will study them with particular care. Did I mention how much I admired your Battle of Rio Sanguo? A worthy master-work. I prefer it to Bartollin’s.”
Masterwork! The praise shocked her into speech. “You do?”
That pulled him away from his painting. “Matra ei Filho! I would not say so if I did not mean it! You see—look here!—how the final touches you put on a painting can give it its entire effect.”
She admired his portrait of Renayo. To learn to paint like that! Surely there was another explanation for the symbology he had painted there, an innocuous one. He meant no harm.
“You will paint this well, one day, if you work. Will you work?” He bent his gaze on her. He was so alive. His talent was a fire, the Luza do’Orro, illuminating everything around him. All was bright where he stood.
“What choice do I have?”
He nodded, satisfied. “In the morning, then.”
In the morning, then.
She rose early and went to the Galerria, but the assistant curatorrio in charge that day had only the laughable gold-leaf guidesheet. She dutifully marked off each of the paintings belonging to the Limners Sario had mentioned, then painstakingly identified them on the walls. It took all morning.
“But there must be a storeroom.”
“Of course there is a storeroom,” said the assistant curatorrio, who found her annoying.
He took her there, opening doors into a long attic crowded with shrouded paintings, crates, and dust. She knelt and uncovered a painting. A somber eyed girl-child in an antique costume stared back at her.
“Matra ei Filho! It will take me weeks to go through this, even if I could identify each one … surely, Maesso, there is an inventory? I cannot believe these would all be crated and put away here without being recorded first.”
“Not done in my time,” said the man. “I have my duties. If you’ll forgive me.” He left her without further ceremony.
She stood, shaking out her skirt, and opened the shutters. Light streamed into the long attic, roiling with motes of dust. Methodically she began to unshroud and uncrate paintings.
In an odd way, the slow repetitious work became obsessive. Long-dead faces stared at her, some with joy, some with sadness, some without the least flicker of interest, as if they were sorry to be standing for a portrait and wished only to be somewhere else. Eiha! They were all somewhere else now, of course: in their graves. She saw, here and there, a glimpse of her ancestors, men in ruffed collars, women in daringly low-cut gowns, with the distinctive Grijalva noses, the dusky skin and gray eyes, that still lived in their descendants: Lord Limners, famous painters, beloved Mistresses.
Old Treaties. Betrothals. Deeds and Deaths and the occasional Divorce framed with a black border. Matra! Who was this bold beauty who clenched a whip in one hand and a bouquet of white poppies—My Bane—in the other? She searched the base of the painting for a clue. Benecitta do’Verrada? Another name that meant nothing to her. She put it aside and went on.
By now her skirt was streaked with dust and no doubt her hair was as well. Never mind. After a while she realized it was getting dark. A massive upright chest with shallow, wide drawers blocked her way. She pulled on a knob and a flat board wheezed out on dry wheels.
Sketches! She sneezed. Here were studies for Treaties and, in another drawer, studies for portraits. Alone in one drawer she found a partial study of what appeared to be a painting to commemorate the first Renayo’s acclamation as Duke and founder of Tira Virte. It was signed with the florid “S” of an anonymous Serrano limner.
She opened a new drawer. Eiha! Here was an entire series of caricaturos of courtiers, some of them very rude! She giggled, choked on a cloud of dust, and coughed.
She found it lodged along the side of the chest where it had, evidently, fallen many years before. She eased out a sheaf of papers creased diagonally. They crackled as she unfolded them. In this light the writing was too small to read.
Her candle had burned down low. She picked it up and went outside. Glass-walled lanterns flickered in the corridor. She held in her hands an old inventory, its date enscribed at the end: Completed by order of Tazita Grijalva in the year 1216. Exactly one hundred years ago.
Imagine! Clutching the precious document, she hurried down to the Galerria. It was closed, dark, and empty, though not locked. Her stomach rumbled. Matra! She had not eaten all day. But her curiosity was more compelling than her hunger.
She lit a lamp and set it on the curatorrio’s table. The inventory was divided into two sections: For display in the Galerria. For storage.
At the top of the list for storage, was The First Mistress, a portrait of Saavedra Grijalva by Sario Grijalva. A short description accompanied the title. A life-sized portrait. Saavedra Grijalva stands behind a table. It is night in her chamber. She is dressed in a gown of ash-rose velurro. She wears a heavy necklace of pearls, and pearls swag her gown. A book lies open on the table. One hand rests on the table, the other points at a line of illumination within the text.
Eleyna rose, hands curled tight on the inventory. Numbly she lifted the lamp by its painted ceramic base and walked—slowly, not truly wanting to get there quickly—to the other end of the Galerria. It was as quiet as a graveyard.
The First Mistress hung in her appointed place. She had a beauty that haunted the eye, for it was so immediately and compellingly sad. Lost forever, as all things are lost. Except Saavedra Grijalva would never be forgotten because of Sario Grijalva’s genius.
But Saavedra’s face and eyes did not compel Eleyna’s attention for more than an instant. With a kind of sick horror, Eleyna examined the rest of the painting as if for the first time.
Saavedra did not stand behind the table. It was not night in the chamber. It was, by the lack of shadow in the room and the quality of the light beyond the arched windows, about midday. The lamp was snuffed. The candle, fat and honeycombed, sat cold on the sill. A book rested on the table, but it was closed, its spine facing away from her, as if the last page had just been read and the book shut.
And Saavedra stood by the iron-studded, iron-bound door, her left hand resting on the latch, her head turned to look into the mirror. Either there was a mistake in the description in the old inventory or someone had made an inaccurate copy of the painting.
Far away, a door opened. She jumped. Without thinking she blew out the lantern and hid in the drapes that blanketed the farthest darkest corner. The darkness, the measured tread of several pairs of feet approaching her hiding place, the hush of fresh nightfall, all combined to rub her nerves raw. Even the twisted light given off by the few shuttered lanterns seemed ominous.
“You must act, Your Grace,” said Sario, his voice heard softly but clearly down the echo
ing long hall. So smooth. So assured! So full of power. “You know the do’Verradas are crippled without a Lord Limner at their side.”
The footsteps came closer. Her heart pounded. They must know she was here. But they stopped before the portrait of Saavedra Grijalva, positioned so she could see by the light of the lamp Sario held their shadows thrown by that light up against the wall and the painting, his shadow looming large over Saavedra’s painted figure.
“This news of Andreo … so shocking! You are sure it is true?”
“Alas, it is true.”
“But you are so young. You say your election will be confirmed by the others?”
“You are the one to make the decision, Your Grace. If you present me to the Viehos Fratos as your new Lord Limner—”
Eleyna bit off a gasp. She dared not stir.
“I do not know you—” This was not the man who had thrown out Rohario. He sounded so unsure. But Grand Duke Renayo never doubted himself.
“Of course you can trust me, Your Grace. If I break our code of honor, my brothers have the means to remove me.”
“Eiha! Of course. A little gruesome to think on….”
“But necessary, when the power the Matra ei Filho blessed us with could be abused by a man with neither honor nor conscience.”
“Of course. It is as you say. You will attend me in the morning, then, Lord Limner Sario?”
“I am honored, Your Grace. I will serve you as faithfully as my namesake served Alejandro do’Verrada.” His shadow bowed toward his Duke, dipping over Saavedra’s body.
Renayo’s shadow made an odd gesture with one hand, but she could not interpret it. Then he left. His footsteps retreated down the Galerria.
Her nose tickled horribly and she wanted very badly to sneeze. Sario did not move. She could not stand this much longer.
He shifted forward into her line of sight, lifting the lamp and walking right up to the painting of Saavedra. He placed a kiss on his fingers and, reaching up, touched his hand to her lips. It was a long stretch.