The Golden Key (44 page)

The clever, infinitely arrogant young man who seemed older than he but was not, was less effusive in his concern. In fact, Alejandro was not certain his Lord Limner was concerned
at all.

He looked up, glowered, scoured hair out of his face with unkind fingers. “Surely you must see,” he said sharply. “Don’t you?”

Sario Grijalva, poised at an easel, arched a brow. “That depends,” he answered. “En verro, I see that you are upset … and I don’t question that you should be; it is not my place to do so—but must news of this sort thrust you into despair?”

Alejandro scowled more blackly yet. “I would not expect that of you.”

A lock of dark hair straggled loose of leather tie, curving forward like a wing to echo the line of the Limner’s jaw. “Because I am your servant?”

Curtly Alejandro snapped, “Because you care for Saavedra.” He paused. “Or so I have been led to believe.”

“And so I do. And if I believed this a threat to her, I assure you I would share your concern.” Grijalva paid fixed attention to his work a moment, nodded approval, then continued. “But where there is no threat, no man need waste concern.”

Alejandro snapped stiffly upright in the chair. “Filho do’canna! You see this as of no moment?”

Grijalva considered that, then set down his paletto, his brush, and perched himself upon a stool to give over full attention to his exasperated Duke. He in his own way was as unpresentable, smeared with paint if not sweat, clad in clothing donned for comfort, activity, and the expectation of getting dirty. “A man might rejoice to know that a king considers him worthy enough for a princess.”

“And so my father’s final task is completed. The suit is accepted.” Alejandro collapsed into the chair again, flopping against leather. Broad hands depending from arms ridged with sinew dangled in eloquent assertion of futility and despair. “What am I to do?”

“Marry her, Your Grace.”

Alejandro scowled. “What about Saavedra?”

“Does it matter?”

“To me! As it should to you!”

“Why? Did you expect me to fall to the floor in despondency and helplessness?” Grijalva bared good teeth briefly—
better than mine!
Alejandro marked in annoyance—and continued before his Duke could frame a retort. “You could refuse, Your Grace.”

It was preposterous. “And hurl insult at Pracanza? Undo what my father began? Perhaps begin a war my conselhos would prefer, while I at the same time must
rely
on their biased counsel? Merditto, Grijalva, you understand nothing!”

Grijalva shrugged elegantly. “Then marry her, Your Grace.”

Alejandro, who had grown to inhabit a body too powerful for elegance, itched. He scratched at hair drying into unkempt spikes. “I am not opposed to marriage, en verro … nor even specifically to the Pracanzan princess, whom I do not know, have never met, have not even
seen
—”

“They are sending a portrait, Your Grace. Perhaps when it arrives, you will feel less concerned.”

“Why?” Alejandro, growing belligerent, was not disposed to courtesy. “If she is beautiful, am I then expected to be pleased
above that which is expected of me in what is otherwise done strictly for politics?”

“As a painter, Your Grace, I am somewhat acquainted with the response engendered by a portrait. A lovely woman or a handsome man solves many worries, Your Grace.”

“Nommo do’Matra, Grijalva—I have to
live
with the woman, not merely gaze upon her painted face!”

“Why not?”

Alejandro froze. “What do you mean?”

“I mean merely that often a man and his wife do not cohabit beyond the necessity of getting children.”

Alejandro knew about that. He recalled all too clearly a memory of his mother, dressing for his infant sister’s naming ceremony, speaking most bitterly about Gitanna Serrano.

Discomfited by the image, he shifted in the chair. “Is that fair? That all wives should be used only to bear children, then forgotten in favor of a mistress?”

“Fair, Your Grace?” The Lord Limner frowned consideringly. “To whom?”

“To the woman! Merditto, Grijalva … if the man goes elsewhere, sleeps in another woman’s bed, what is it to the wife but insult?”

The answering tone was mild, without color of any kind save quiet, idle inquiry. “Then Your Grace will pension Saavedra off? Bestow upon her a distant country estate even as the late Duke bestowed such upon Gitanna Serrano?”

Furious, insulted, frustrated beyond thought, Alejandro lurched out of the chair so dramatically it screeched across stone flags to hook a leg on a rug. “By the Mother, Grijalva—” And stopped.
What am I to do? Insult my new bride by keeping a mistress, or insult Saavedra—and make myself miserable!—by sending her away
?

“So.” Grijalva hunched now on the stool, hooked heels over a rung and rested his chin upon clasped hands. “How may I help you, Your Grace?”

“There
is
no help for this.”

“There is. The proper man may provide a remedy … and you selected me to
be
the proper man, no?”

“But …” Alejandro frowned. “What can you do?”

Grijalva laughed softly. “Paint.”

“But how is
that
to make a difference? You document everything, that I know, but what can you do for this? Paint me out of love with Saavedra, and
in
love with the Pracanzan girl?”

The painter considered it. “If you wish.”

“Merditto! Don’t mock me! This serves nothing, Grijalva.”

“Then I will offer another answer.”

“
What
answer? What answer is there? Unless you may find a way of painting this woman into acquiescence that I have a mistress—eiha, I know my father had several, but I also know how it hurt my mother!—or if you may find a way of painting Saavedra to always be mine, there is nothing you may do. And none of these things
can
you do!”

Grijalva shook his head. “We do more than you believe, Your Grace. We are painters, but also diviners.” His quick smile was odd, yet was banished too quickly for examination. “We paint the truth. We paint falsehood. We paint a man into presentability, a woman into beauty, so that a match may be made. We paint a couple who have been at war for decades, yet by recapturing the love, honor, and respect in painted images we remind them of what once was, and they
remember.
We flatter, Your Grace; we take instruction as to how we should begin, proceed, complete; we make and unmake, recreate and reclaim every part of the world.” He lifted one shoulder in a slight shrug. “The portrait sent with your father was painted with the eyes of love, with the heart and soul of a woman who had bound herself to you. No one else would have made such a likeness, would have presented you as
she
sees you … in such a way that the Pracanzan princess also saw you. And answered.”

Alejandro drew breath, gusted it out. “Then paint me Saavedra with those same eyes, with that heart and soul, so that I may never lose her.”

For one moment, Sario Grijalva’s poise deserted. And then was reestablished. “To do that, Your Grace—”

“—the painter should love Saavedra.” Alejandro did not smile. “Then such a task should be within your abilities, yes?”

Grijalva’s face was white as new linen. In the eyes dwelled cold anger, a bitter anger, and loss beyond comprehension.

Trembling from a complex tangle of emotions he could not begin to identify, among them jealousy, frustration, desperation, Alejandro do’Verrada put one foot in front of the other and reached his Lord Limner, stood beside his Lord Limner, looked into the unmasked face, the eyes of passion, of obsession. “She says you believe yourself of infinite value to a man in need. Then let it be agreed, en verro, that I am a man in need. You shall thus apply yourself to this task and
prove
that worth.”

After a moment, Grijalva took up his brush again. Steady of hand, he began to paint. “I can do that, Your Grace.”

At the doorway Alejandro paused, turned back. “I will never give her up. And you will never again suggest that I should.”

Eventually he answered, “Your Grace, be assured that when I am finished no man living may ever suggest such a thing.”

The boy crouched like servant, like supplicant. His attention was wholly focused on his task, so deeply lost that he did not hear her come to him, or stop; was not at all aware of her presence even as she waited. He merely knelt upon the courtyard tile beside the fountain and sketched, chalk dissolving into powder against poor-grade paper spread atop weather-pitted tile.

A stray breeze lifted mist from the fountain, carried it to dust her face with moisture. To Saavedra it felt good; to the boy it brought with it frustration. “Filho do’canna!” he hissed, and hitched himself and his paper around so that his back warded his work against importunate wind and water.

He saw her then, and his face blazed. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Momentita,” she answered. She looked beyond his embarrassed, self-conscious face to the work itself. “Sario.”

Ignaddio nodded, sat up, did not look at her face, as if afraid to see her expression communicate disapproval or disappointment.

Saavedra studied it, marking technique, the first suggestion of style as yet unrecognized. “He has an expressive face, no?”

Ignaddio hitched a shoulder.

“Have you spent much time observing him?”

“Before he went to the Duke.” Now he was anxious, no longer avoiding her eyes. “You
knew
it was he!”

“There is no question of it.” She smiled to see his relief. “You have a good eye for line, though your perspective requires work.”

“How?” He stood up hastily, dragging the paper from the tile. “How may I improve it?”

No protest. No defense. Simply an inquiry into how he might improve.
Eiha, he will be a good learner.
“Do you see this line here? The angle here between nose and eye?” He nodded. “You have drawn them too perfectly—no face is truly balanced. One eye is set higher, one lower … one is set closer to the bridge of the nose, so; the other is not so close.” She touched a fingernail lightly to the indicated lines. “Do you see? There. And there.”

“I see! Eiha, ‘Vedra, I
see
—” He caught his breath. “Will you show me?”

“Ah, but it is for you to do. I have told you what I see, now you must see it for yourself, and correct it.” She smiled, recalling how swiftly Sario demonstrated corrections and improvements by
doing
, not by asking.
I will not do the same with ‘Naddi. He deserves to make his own mistakes, and correct them in his own hand.
“You must always be hungry, ‘Naddi … to improve technique, your talent, you must always be hungry.”

“I
am
hungry!” he said. “There is so much left to learn, and no matter what I do, it seems the moualimos are always adding more.” He sighed, heaving narrow shoulders. “Rinaldo says I may never catch up.”

She knew what that meant. “Rinaldo undergoes Confirmattio soon?”

“In a week.” Ignaddio stared down at his powder-smeared hands, clasping paper and chalk. “They will send him to the women in six days.”

Saavedra restrained the impulse to set a comforting hand to his cap of dark curls; a boy on the cusp of manhood did not wish to be treated by any woman as if he were still young. “Your turn will come. I promise. Perhaps in
two
weeks, and then you will not be behind Rinaldo by much time at all.”

It did not placate. “But I am
older!
”

“Are you?” She affected surprise. “I thought it otherwise.”

He shook his head vehemently. “
I
am older. By two whole days.”

Saavedra shaped her sudden grin into a smile; he would take offense at anything more than mild humor. “But surely there are things you do that are superior to his. Color, perhaps? Perspective?”

“No, you have just said my perspective needs improvement.” It was stated as fact, nothing more, which spoke well of his attitude. “And he mixes colors better, also. But the moualimos have said I have a good eye for shadow.” He grinned proudly. “I used Sario’s painting of the exterior of the Cathedral Imagos Brilliantos for a model; the moualimos say he captured the shadows of the arches and the belltowers far better than anyone.”

“Eiha, in art he is not so poor an example to mimic,” she agreed, “but recall that his compordotta was far less advanced—and far
more
troublesome!—than yours.”

Ignaddio was not impressed by that. “If I could be as he is, I
would suffer any punishment they wished to give me for poor compordotta.”

“’Naddi!”

His eyes implored her. “I want to be
good
, ‘Vedra. I want to be as he is, to be Lord Limner and serve the Duke. Isn’t it what we train for? Isn’t it what
you
would train for if you were a man, and Gifted?”

It took her like a blow. She defined herself by her art first, her gender lastly, but even by art she was defined a woman because she could never be more than she was: female, and not Gifted. Talented perhaps, but meant for no more than a man who was proved fertile, and thus incapable of the true-talent that those of the Viehos Fratos must exhibit, or a potential Lord Limner.