The Golden Key (23 page)

Seminno Raimon, rigid spine pressed against the doorjamb, clasped Sanguo Otavio’s shoulder as the older man came in. “Rapidia, grazzo—he weakens quickly …” And to Davo, behind Otavio: “It comes now. Adezo. There is no time at all. …”

“Are we all here?” Davo asked, pausing before the door.

“No—no …” Raimon cast a quick, assessive glance over the others gathering like crows—and so they were, he realized with a start: crows at the death site, waiting for the living body to become dead. “We are missing Sario—and Ferico—”

“No.” Ferico came up and put a hand on Davo’s sleeve to ask mutely for passage. “
I
am here, but Sario … eiha!—have you ever known Sario to be where he is expected?”

“—no time …” Raimon murmured distractedly.

Davo moved aside, but Ferico did not enter at once. “Have you summoned sancta and sancto?”

Raimon hesitated minutely. “I sent for the Premias, yes, but—”

“Premias! Are you mad?” Ferico exploded. “They won’t concern themselves with the passing of a Grijalva!”

Otavio joined them, expression severe. “And should we wish it? This is a private matter—”

“And we have not been of any import to the Ecclesia since before the Nerro Lingua,” Ferico declared. “We Grijalvas do not count—”

“Chi’patros,” Davo said plainly. Even in succinctness it was eloquent explanation, and a damning one.

“Bassda!” Raimon hissed. “Will you have us argue even at Arturro’s deathbed?”

“And why not?” Ferico murmured dryly. “He would wish us to be as we are.”

Tension lessened; Raimon could not suppress a brief smile—and then reflected that both the irony and the smile would be welcome to Arturro.

Despair abruptly engulfed him; what would the new order bring? “Matra Dolcha,” he said fervently, “I wish this had not come!”

“It comes to us all,” Otavio said repressively.

Davo clasped and lifted his Chieva do’Orro, pressing it against his lips. “Nommo Matra ei Filho,” he whispered. “In Their Blessed Names, offer this man peaceful passage, good light along the way—”

Otavio made a rude sound. “This man may well have passed already during all this lengthy chatter—we had best attend him. Adezo!”

Raimon lingered even as the others turned toward the bedchamber adjoining the solar. “Sario—”

“He is not here!” Ferico snapped. “Would you have us request Arturro politely delay his death long enough to find him? Bassda!—let him be where he is, Raimon. He has never been one of us; why should he be so now?”

“He
is
one of us—”

“Bassda,” Ferico repeated. “There is no time.”

Otavio smiled with poisonous insincerity. “If you value the boy so much, why not have him paint Arturro’s
Peintraddo Memorrio
?”

“
If
you can ever find him.” Davo clapped a hand on Raimon’s stiff shoulder. “Come. We can bicker later. Amaniaja.”

Amaniaja. Tomorrow. Always, with so many: amaniaja.

But Arturro would never see it. This day was his last.

Saavedra accepted her task without question, without comment, without protest. She would do anything for Seminno Raimon, who had always been kind—and who just this moment looked tense and distraught—and obligingly went out into the streets in search of Sario. It was, she knew, an unlikely hope; and why Raimon expected
her
to be able to find him when two others sent out had not … eiha, but perhaps Seminno Raimon knew her better than she thought. As she knew Sario better than any other.

But still… in the midst of a festival day
? She doubted she could find her shoes, albeit she wore them; Meya Suerta today would be impossible.

Zenita: noon, and noisy with it. Sanctia bells throughout the city tolled the hour, the celebration. Today, as every year, the Mother conceived the Son, and ten months later, at daybreak of Nov’viva Premia, the Son was born.

Just now she wished it
were
Nov’viva; though spring, the day was warm, made sticky with early humidity and the press of too
many people. Nov’viva could be cold, but there were never so many visitors—raw provinciales—as there were during Fuega Vesperra.

Already the mass of hair pinned up but hours before came loose of its crimped copper tethers. Weight clogged her neck, straggled laggardly down her spine. She shielded her eyes from the glare of the sun with a hand against her brow, and saw in silhouette, looming above the rooftops one street over, the massive bell towers and tiled roofline of the Cathedral Imagos Brilliantos.

If I could climb into one of the towers
… Surely from there she would find Sario even in the crush in the Zocalo Grando—but it would not be permitted. She was not a sancta, not even a noviciata; worse, she was chi’patro. There was not a sancta or sancto within the entire city who would let her ascend the tower to look for another chi’patro. And though she could in poor light be mistaken for a full-blooded Tira Virteian, they would know better: by the paint stains upon her clothing, by the chalk dust beneath her nails, by the clinging scent of solvents. Members of the Ecclesia searched avidly for such signs.

Saavedra’s mouth hooked tautly. Under her breath she murmured, “I wonder how they justify their devotion to the Duchess Jesminia? It was
she
who gave us welcome!”

Of course, the Duchess Jesminia had been a do’Shagarra, wed to a do’Verrada. Do’Shagarra and do’Verrada did precisely whatever they chose to do.

But Saavedra supposed the tower was not so vital after all. Surely she would be deafened by the pealing of the bells, and not even for Sario would she sacrifice her hearing.

“Hot …” She lifted the fallen hair from her neck—and then knew what she would do. “The fountain!” It was tall enough, and cool enough—and infinitely more quiet than the belltower—and no one would disapprove no matter what her blood; if anything, there would be difficulty in finding space on a basin tier that was not already taken.

One street away, little more than a stone’s throw, but it took time and effort to make her way through the crowd. In the end she shut her ears to the curses, the strident comments, and simply thrust herself through the throng, ignoring bruised toes, snagged clothing, tumbling hair. By the time she reached the Zocalo Grando she was sheened in sweat, and battered by careless feet and elbows. Her shoes, sandals only, provided little protection; she swore to herself
he would seek a cool bath as soon as she found Sario and they returned to Palasso Grijalva.

If
she found Sario.

“Merditto alba,” she muttered. “Such a fortunate man, to be so gifted, so blessed, so
certain
… you walk through the city as if you were Duke yourself!”

Or the Duke’s Lord Limner.

“Matra,” Saavedra breathed, “you believe it is only time … you believe yourself it already.”

But Zaragosa Serrano was Lord Limner, and Duke Baltran yet lived. It would be Don Alejandro’s duty, when he was Duke in his father’s place, to appoint the new Lord Limner.

“Bassda …” She worked again through the crowd, made her way to the fountain. As expected, there were wreaths of children festooned on the carved tiers, luxuriating in spray or even standing in the basins with water up to their knees. “Seminno Raimon has given you a task, ‘Vedra—” She hiked the loose folds of crumpled linen skirts. “—and this task you shall perform—
Matra
, no, don’t push!” She glared at the boy who competed for her place upon the marble edge. “There is room for us both, meninno.” Saavedra clutched wet stone, soaking hem and sandals. The cool water, slopping over, turned worn leather soles slick beneath her feet. “I may look like a moronna, but this is the only way—and besides, I am cool …
nommo do’Matra!
” She wavered, astounded, as a hand touched her foot.

“Forgive me,” a man said diffidently, “but you did not hear me over the noise of the water.”

Nor over her mutterings as well. Saavedra, taken aback, stared down at the man. He was not what one might expect to find in the midst of Meya Suerta on festival day, braving the crush; he was old, very old, far beyond fifty, perhaps even beyond
sixty.
“Nommo Matra ei Filho,” she murmured. “Why are you not dead?”

“Because,” he said simply, “I am not a Grijalva.”

He knew. Looking at her, he knew.
But—I am not a Gifted, to wear the chain and key
… And he was not a sancto to know her by her paint and chalk. She was merely a woman, no different from any other. Tira Virteian, Pracanzan, Ghillasian—it simply did not matter. No one, looking at her, knew what she was.

“Chi’patro,” he said gently, and her conviction was shattered. “Ai, no,” he said as she wavered, clutched again at marble,
“please—grazzo … will you take my hand? Will you come down?”

It was an ancient hand, thin, spotted, palsied, tendons standing up in wiry relief beneath parchment flesh, but extended without hesitation to steady her. Saavedra considered the hand, considered coming down, considered what he knew and how he had come to know it, and what had brought him to her.

Beneath the crisp, precise folds of a bleached linen turban, the face was no less aged than the hand. But it smiled, it crinkled a multiplicity of creases into warmth and kindness, and clear gray eyes promised equal comfort.

“Honor an old man,” he suggested, “and share some sweet juice with him. You need not fear,
al-adib zev’reina
, we shall not be alone. You will have familiar company.”

The term he used was foreign, inflected with a rhythm she had never heard. “
What
familiar company?”

“Another Grijalva,” he answered. “Another chi’patro.”

“But who—?” And then she knew. “Sario.”

“Ai, Sario …” Withered lips trembled in compressed smile. “If you know how I have prayed,
al-adib zev’reina
!”

“What is that?” she asked, clinging yet to marble. “What is that you call me? In what language?”

“Ai, forgive an old man, grazzo … it is strange to you, I know, the lingua oscurra. To Sario also.”

“‘Dark tongue?”’ Saavedra frowned. “
Nerro
Lingua was a plague.”

“Ai, no, forgive me.” He placed the hand against his heart. “I am estranjiero, a stranger to your land. I speak your language—I have lived here many years—but there are times my own tongue is simpler, times it sings a richer song.” Once again the palsied, blemished hand was extended. “It means the ‘Hidden Language.”’

“Lingua oscurra.” She considered it. “And why should I accompany a man who must hide his language?”

“Chi’patro,” he said deliberately, neither taking nor offering offense, “how is it that you can ask me such a thing?”

It silenced her. The spray now was chill, setting her to shivering. “He is with you? Sario?”

“He gave me to say, should you question the truth: ‘Nommo Chieva do’Orro.”’

In the Name of the Golden Key. Tantamount to an order. But from Sario, no matter the circumstance, not entirely unexpected.
And proof that it was he: no one but a Gifted Grijalva knew the phrase, save for her, with whom he shared so much.

And now this. An estranjiero who speaks a hidden language.
“’Cordo,” she said. “I’ll come.” And bent to put her hand into his surprisingly firm grasp.

  TWELVE