CHAPTER 21
ILHAS DAS SEREIAS
When Oriana had left Amado, Inês Guerra was a gawky twelve or thirteen. She’d matured past her awkwardness. She was as tall as Oriana herself now, although slimmer and strikingly beautiful. Her curling flaxen hair had darkened to a golden shade, and she wore it loose to emphasize her youth. She wore the bright blue of the Guerra line, a pareu with gold and orange embroidery at the hem.
Duilio escorted the fleeing lovers back into the main hall of the Guerra house. Inês was clearly angry, but she’d always been given to high drama. Lieutenant Costa stood a couple of feet behind her, wearing only a black pareu. He bore the winglike mark of the Guerra line across his chest, but Oriana assumed it was painted. He wouldn’t have had time to heal from a tattoo yet, would he? He was trying to maintain a defiant expression, but seemed far more intimidated than Inês. The swelling forming on the left side of his chin made him look a bit pathetic.
Oriana met the other woman’s eyes steadily, and saw that Inês knew quite well who had the upper hand. She gestured for the young woman to sit in a heavy wooden chair, and settled across from her in its mate. Duilio came to stand behind her, just as Costa stood behind Inês’ chair. “Does your mother know you’re here, Inês?”
Inês’ chin lifted. “No.”
Oriana signaled that she needed to think. In truth, she wanted Inês to squirm for a moment. She surveyed Inês, taking in her lovely face, her tall and strong frame. “Why Costa?” she asked bluntly. “You could likely have had any male on this island. Your family is well connected and you appear to be healthy. Why choose a human male for your lover? Why a member of my household?”
As she’d expected, Inês’ jaw clenched at her use of the term lover. It carried the implication that Costa wasn’t actually her mate. Not yet.
“I love him,” Inês said.
Standing behind Inês’ chair, Costa actually blushed.
“Did you call him?” Oriana asked. “Did he have any choice in this?”
Costa impressed Oriana by not speaking out of turn. He’d clearly learned from the past few months watching Duilio hold his tongue. Perhaps he would adapt.
“No,” Inês said. “I did call him out to the beach that morning, but nothing more than seeking his presence, I swear. He has his own mind.”
Oriana looked at Costa’s face, permissible since he was part of her household no matter what the tattoo claimed. He hadn’t misunderstood that last question, one she’d asked out of concern for him. He nodded once, which reassured her. There was hope, then, that they could untangle this mess. “Then we won’t force him away from you, but we want answers before we commit to helping you out of this situation.”
Inês blinked, as if surprised that they might help them. “I had no right to take him, I know,” she said. “Not without his mother’s permission, or yours.”
“Then why not court him properly?”
“I wanted to,” Inês insisted. “When I learned he was coming here, to your grandmother’s house, I abandoned my job at the Spanish embassy and took the ferry here. I planned to approach you to ask permission, but on the morning after he arrived, he came to me on the beach and told me something had happened to his luggage. I realized the boy must have hidden in his bag, of all the terrible luck. I knew Julio would be blamed for the theft and sent back to Portugal. I couldn’t allow that.”
There was a great deal of information in that passionately delivered speech. “You knew about the theft?”
Inês drew herself up. “The boy is a thief, and he’d been in the Monteiro house, so he stole something. I couldn’t let Julio be blamed. He needed my protection.”
Oriana didn’t look at Costa’s face. Most Portuguese men would flinch at being referred to in such a way by a woman. But the relationship between Inês and Costa—Julio, she reminded herself—was their business. Perhaps he wanted her protection. If he was willing to defer to her regularly, their relationship might work out well. “And how did you know that the boy was in the house?”
“I was going out to the beach to see if I could find Julio not long after four. I saw the boy coming out of the shadows of your grandmother’s house toward the beach. He met the woman there, and they hid in one of my mother’s courtyards until dawn. Of all the places to pick,” she finished ruefully.
That was a coincidence? Oriana felt her jaw clench. This was the time when she needed a Truthsayer, a witch who could parse out the truth of a speaker’s claims. Perhaps she should include a recommendation to hire one in her next report to the Foreign Office. “It never occurred to you to confront them? Or to come to us and report the theft so we could confront them?”
Inês folded her arms over her chest. “I’d been working at the Spanish embassy. I knew you wouldn’t believe me. But I told my mother to tell you about them.”
She’d talked her mother into lying about the woman and boy, a backward way of getting their description back to the Portuguese. It was a strange choice, but hinted that Inês wasn’t completely against them. “How did you know the boy was a thief?”
“Everyone at the embassy knew it,” she said with a graceful shrug.
Oriana regarded Inês silently, trying to decide what trouble spot in her story needed attention first. She finally decided she should start at the beginning. “How did you meet Costa?”
Inês took a deep breath. “Madam Davila paid me extra to suborn one of your guards. I could hardly turn her down without her growing suspicious of me.”
Madam Davila was the wife of the Spanish ambassador, and many felt she held the true power at that embassy, not her often-ailing husband. “Does she know you’re Amadean?”
Inês shook her head. “No. I used my father’s line name, Palmeira.”
“So you accepted Madam Davila’s charge?” Oriana prompted.
“Yes. I watched the guards for a few days and I picked Julio. I liked the way he smiled.”
Costa flushed again.
Oriana couldn’t fault Inês’ logic. She’d always admired Duilio’s smiles. She pressed on. “Where have you been meeting him?”
“At the park where the human men are allowed to walk.”
A small park was located between the embassy compounds, fenced so that only embassy personnel would enter—the one place they could get fresh air and exercise when not on duty. But there were sereia who loitered nearby to watch the spectacle of human males parading about . . . or to taunt them with their calls.
“At night?” Oriana asked, wondering if the lieutenant had ever had bad dreams as he’d told the captain. More likely he wasn’t sleeping at all.
“Yes,” Inês admitted.
“How did he get off embassy grounds to meet you?”
Inês shrugged.
Oriana suspected Duilio would have to get that out of Costa privately. Costa had erred in slipping out at night to meet a local woman, and later in running away with her rather than facing any accusations made against him. Inês made the mistake of assuming Costa would be blamed and also that she wouldn’t be believed. But Madam Davila’s misstep was the source of this; she’d chosen the wrong employee to spy on the Portuguese soldiers. She’d chosen an Amadean, a woman who might look on a human male as a potential mate rather than a simple target for seduction.
Oriana sat back in the chair, laying one hand on each arm. “I am willing to help you gain the approval of Costa’s family and therefore mine. We can transport you both to Portugal to seek them out, with the assurance that Costa won’t be jailed for desertion, if you are willing to meet certain conditions.”
Inês glanced up at Costa’s face. She understood, then, that he could be imprisoned for desertion of duties. She looked back to Oriana. “What do you want in return?”
“At this moment? Information.”
“And what happens to us?”
“Costa will resume his dut
ies until he returns to Portugal. You will be allowed to stay at my grandmother’s house as a guest of the mission. When he goes back to Portugal, you will go with him and seek his family’s permission to marry. He will resign his position with the military. Then you will both be free to return here.”
“And he won’t be charged?” Inês asked cautiously.
“Not so long as we can claim his absence for the past week was an effort to track you.”
Inês sat back, mouth agape. “That’s ridiculous.”
Oriana tapped her nails on the arm of the chair, and then recalled that her aunt Jovita had done the same thing when vexed. She stilled her fingers. “Not at all. Only his captain and Lieutenant Benites knew he didn’t have permission to leave. They are, I believe, willing to support that ridiculous premise to safeguard the overall reputation of the mission. For all the others know, Costa’s been on a special assignment all this time.”
That wasn’t strictly the truth. All the guards suspected Costa’s defection, but since the captain and Benites had kept quiet, they couldn’t prove he’d left without orders.
Inês sat back in her chair, eyes narrowed.
“Or are you suggesting it’s ridiculous,” Oriana continued, “because he couldn’t possibly have found you if he was trying?”
Inês fumed, but couldn’t affirm that in Costa’s presence. “We’ll take your offer,” she said firmly. “Now, what do you want to know?”
* * *
Duilio caught Costa’s eye and nodded toward the far archway.
Costa glanced down at Inês and gestured discreetly toward the door. She nodded, granting her permission, so he followed Duilio from the main hall. Duilio waited until they’d gotten into a hallway before asking, “Do you miss trousers yet?”
Costa returned a perplexed look. “How did you know?”
“It’s the one thing I miss. I could go bare-chested and without shoes daily, but there are days I wish trousers were acceptable here.”
“Inês says I should start a new fashion.”
What an unusual thing for Inês to say. Duilio wondered if she meant that, or if she’d merely said it to appease Costa. He opened the door that led to one of the sitting rooms, shooed the lieutenant inside, and closed the door. “Who was helping you get off embassy grounds at night?”
Costa went pale. “We’re not prisoners there, sir. It wasn’t illegal. And if you want the others to keep silent about my absence, I have to return that discretion.”
He hadn’t expected Costa to have worked that out. Perhaps he’d underestimated the young man’s intelligence. “How long have you been meeting with her?”
Costa flushed again. “Almost two months, sir. Not every day, but regularly.”
There was definitely someone closemouthed among the guards to have held that secret for him. Duilio suspected Corporal Pinho. He and Costa were on good terms. “And you left with her willingly that morning?”
“Yes. I knew that if something had been stolen, I would be suspected, sir. Because of what happened with my luggage.”
Duilio gazed at Costa. “Do you not want to return to Portugal? You’re willing to stay here the rest of your life instead?”
Costa’s shoulders squared. “I’m not clever like you, sir, but I’m not stupid. I’m the last of five sons. Most of the money will go to my eldest brother to keep the estate running. I barely recall speaking to my father as a child, and my mother died when I was too young to remember her. There’s not much waiting for me back there. Given these last few months, I doubt I have an illustrious military career ahead of me.”
Looked at that way, it had to have been a simple decision. “You are, essentially, a fortune hunter.”
Costa didn’t deny it, mouth in a thin line. “It was a practical choice, sir.”
He didn’t claim that he loved Inês, but when Duilio had been holding a gun on him, Costa told her to run, to leave him to face his fate. Even if Costa hadn’t said as much, he must care for her. “You understand that life here will be very different?”
“I have watched you, sir, for the last three months. I’ve seen how different it is.”
Duilio wanted to point out that he had a very tolerant wife, and also the protection of a handful of guards on most occasions. Then again, Costa had been there during the embarrassing incident in the marketplace, so he knew there could be very awkward moments. “Is your mother’s mother still alive? To give her approval.”
“My grandmother? Yes,” Costa said. “And no matter what my father says, she’s fond of me and will agree. I know she will.”
“You’ve given that some thought.”
“We were hoping to travel to Portugal to ask,” Costa said, frustration creeping into his tone, “but when we spoke to the Portuguese captain in harbor, he wouldn’t take us as passengers. I suspect that was your doing, sir.”
“I’m afraid so, Lieutenant.”
“Then why help us now?”
Duilio smiled at Costa, wanting to set the younger man at ease. “The Guerra family and the Monteiro family are neighbors. I would rather get along. You help us substantiate the claim that you were on a special mission, and we’ll help you clear your conscience.”
* * *
Oriana turned back to Inês once the men were gone. “I want to talk about what happened before Costa. Why have you been asking questions about me?”
Inês scowled. “You’re supposed to be dead, executed, but three months ago you turned up alive. I needed to know why.”
“Because of your cousin?”
“If you’re alive,” she said with a quick shake of her head, “then Safira could be.”
Oriana tapped her fingernails on the arm’s chair. “How did you come to that conclusion?”
“About six months ago a woman approached me with questions about my cousin—her position in the ministry and her execution. When I pressed, the woman told me she investigated all executions, a routine matter for the ministry, and asked if I’d known any of the others she was investigating. It seemed strange, so I decided to investigate myself. Before her arrest, the ministry had Safira working at the Spanish embassy, so I found a position there.”
“Why not go to the ministry itself?”
Inês wrapped her hands together, betraying anxiety. “The executed women were all in the ministry, like you, like Safira. All had talent but were never placed in positions of responsibility. All had powerful family members inside the ministry, but that didn’t make any difference. It didn’t help their careers. It was as if they were held back. Then they were charged and executed.”
Oriana thought back on her two years in the Golden City. The trajectory of the career path Inês described was quite familiar. “And what happened to that woman, the one who was asking questions?”
“I don’t know,” Inês said.
“Do you believe she was from the Ministry of Intelligence, as she claimed?”
Inês sat still, her lips pursed. She tapped her index finger and thumb together, a sign either that she was about to lie or that she was afraid to answer. “She had too much information to be anything other than ministry, but it sounded more like she was investigating them—the ministry—questioning the motives behind the executions.”
“As you did,” Oriana pointed out.
“True. I suspect one part of the ministry is investigating another. The questions started after you were left on the Ilhas de Morte. You were the first agent on foreign soil to be accused of treason. That means you were the only one under the foreign intelligence wing. I think someone within the ministry—in that department—took exception to your execution and started an inquiry.”
“Any idea who?”
Inês licked her lips nervously. “If I were to guess, I would point to Jovita Paredes.”
Her aunt had moved to save her when she’d been left to die, hadn�
�t she? The timeline was beginning to make sense. “Did you learn anything about the other women?”
“Not much,” Inês admitted. “I’ve lost my position with the Spanish now, so I don’t know how to find out what happened to my cousin. I still pray every day that she’s alive somewhere, and that she’ll return.”
“You gave up finding out your cousin’s fate?”
“I had to,” Inês said, her shoulders squaring. “For Julio.”
Oriana touched her chin, acceptance without belief.
Inês’ nostrils flared. “Have you never been in love?”
Oriana licked her lips. She had obeyed orders until her execution. She had left Duilio’s comfortable home, even knowing she was in love with him. And she had bent her orders as far as she could so that she could avenge a friend’s death. But she had, in the end, followed her orders, and had nearly died for that loyalty.
“The woman who was with the boy?” Oriana asked, changing tacks. “What can you tell me about her?”
Inês shrugged. “She was at the Spanish embassy, but I only caught a glimpse of her once. She was sequestered, locked in a room.”
That seemed needlessly cruel. “Locked up? Why?”
“She’s ill. Gill rot, I think. No one wanted to talk to her.”
Oriana gestured for Inês to wait as she thought that through. Gill rot was the common name for tuberculosis on the islands. For sereia the disease usually attacked the gills and air bladders before the lungs. Leandra might have been wearing a neck clap to keep from infecting others. That also would explain why Leandra had slept in the Guerra courtyard instead of trying to find a room at an inn. “So you didn’t know her name—Leandra Rocha?”
The young woman’s mouth formed an O of surprise. “I know that name,” she whispered. “She was on the list. One of the early ones, I think.”
The list that the mysterious agent of the ministry had presented to her. Oriana wasn’t surprised. “She worked at the American embassy, not the Spanish, but she was executed like me . . . and your cousin.”
Inês sat for a moment, one slender hand laid over her mouth. “I wrote most of the names down,” she said after a moment, “in my journal. It’s at my mother’s house. I can tell you other names.”
The Shores of Spain Page 18